Frozen in Time
by Teresa12
Summary: Pitch hasn't been back since the Dark Ages. But fear has always been there. In the shadows. And now it's rising again. When Jack Overland Frost wakes up on the ice, he can't remember anything. Including the best friend who refuses to let him go. So when Pitch sends the Guardians into an eternal sleep, it's up to Jack and Griffin to find a cure; or risk losing the Guardians forever.
1. Prologue

The last thing he remembered was her eyes. Turning from relief to joy and just as rapidly to terror and fear, as he looked down and saw the ice fracture, the fault lines joining and spreading until it could hold no more. It was time to go. It shattered. And then there was only darkness. Darkness and cold. And broken hearts.

* * *

She was sitting around the fire when a figure came running into the village. She got up immediately, sensing something was wrong. The little girl ran straight to her, barefoot, her skates dangling by the laces from one small arm. Tears streamed down her face and her nose glowed red from the cold.

"Alison, what happened?" she asked gently, kneeling down beside her. The little girl shook her head silently, too distraught to speak.

"Where's Jack?" she pressed, a cold stone of fear settling in her chest. The little girl just cried harder, arms around her stomach, trying to hold the pieces of her crumbling self together.

"Alison, _where's Jack_?" she cried, fists clenched, desperately trying not to think of the worst. But trying not to think about it only makes you remember how unthinkable the thought is.

"We were at the lake…skating," the little girl sobbed. "He fell through the ice." Another sob. "And he never came back up."

The world spun. Flames danced in and out of her vision, and the moon flashed eerily in her eyes. She staggered away, arms clutching her midriff, desperately choking down sobs. She swung her hands around her, as if she could magically spin back the time and her hand dipped in the flames, throbbing angrily with a burning sensation. But she didn't feel. The pain helped her focus.

She scooped up the still-sobbing girl and forced her upon a woman nearby, a neighbour, who began to comfort the inconsolable girl. And willing herself to stay in control, she took off running, staggering through the snow to a small house on the village outskirts that she knew well.

Her hair whipped around her face in the wind, and she could taste the blood streaming from her mouth where she'd bit her lip hard to drown the emotion raging inside of her. When she reached the house she flew up the stairs to the porch, averting her eyes from the scatter of Jack-sized shoes by the door.

She hammered on the door, her burnt hand bloody and crying out for her to stop, but her mind said keep going, drown the pain with more pain so there's no pain at all. The door eventually opened, a square of bright light piercing the night.

"Griffin what is it?" She avoided eye contact with her. Her eyes were too much like his.

"It's Jack." Griffin managed to say in a surprisingly steady voice. Griffin raised her eyes to look at her, stabs of pain racing through her head, flashes of fractured memories.

"Jack's dead." And everything went black


	2. Chapter 1

The fire is still burning by the time we make it back into the village. My hand throbs angrily at the sight of it. Most of the villagers are gathered around the fire, some crying silently, others staring into the flames, as if wishing they would swallow them up whole. I entirely agree with them.

Alison runs toward her mother as soon as she sees her, and both of them sit down by the fire, crying silently. People rush around, getting food and drink for the bereft family. Someone has covered them in a blanket, and echoes of this night ten years ago are whispered around the camp. Except it wasn't Alison who was cradled in her mother's arms, mourning. It was Jack. All of the village were crying over a different death, a man whom Alison never knew.

People are huddled in groups, hot drinks in hand. I sit down in the snow, outside the of the ring of the fire's light, and bury my hand in the snow. The pain is finally catching up to me. I sit like that for a while, quietly observing the activities of grief; that of comforting and mourning, of pain and loss. But no one takes notice of the quiet girl outside the ring of flame. No one ever does.

I mean, just because you don't _show_ the emotion, doesn't mean that you don't _feel _it. Just because you have a flawless façade doesn't mean you're not crumbling inside.

A group of girls from school are gathered nearby, a few of them crying. It's weird how when somebody dies, all the negative memories seem to evaporate with them. So despite the fact that many of the townsfolk were a bit disapproving of Jack and his reckless escapades, they are the same people huddled around the fire crying over his death. Talk about irony.

"Poor Emma. She's already lost Harry and now Jack as well," laments one of the women nearby.

"We'll try and recover him in the morning," says her husband, one of the farmers who live on the outskirts of the village, near Jack's house. This sentence jolts my memory and I yank my hand out of its snow hole and stand up.

"Why can't we recover him now? It's a full moon. He could have come up after Alison left. He could be okay." I say to the farmer.

"It's too dangerous. We can't lose anyone else," he says gruffly, before getting up to go talk to another villager across the fire. His wife looks at me.

"No one can hold their breath for that long, not even Jack Overland," she says sadly. "I'm sorry, Griffin." I give her a withering look, and start to walk over to my spot in the snow, but to do this I have to walk past the girls from school.

One of them turns and looks at me, and like a murder of crows they follow their leader until every one of their weak eyes are fixed on me.

"Poor Griffin. Poor, inconsolable Griffin. Who wants to think that Jack is still alive. Who refuses to think he is dead because of her _belief _in him," says one girl.

It takes a lot of self-control to stop myself from punching her stupid face, before I remember that punching anyone with this hand would probably hurt me more than them.

"Jack is _dead _Griffin. Do you know what that means? Wait, of course you do because half your family is dead. My mistake," says another girl.

"I wonder why she's so upset that he's dead. Maybe because they were best friends? Perhaps , but I think it could be that Griffin—" snarls a girl with a ridiculously satisfied smirk on her face that fades slightly when she sees my fit flying at her face and she lurches backward with impact and almost falls off the log. Thank God for being left-handed.

"That is for lying." I say. I punch the girl who made the first comment hard in the stomach and she doubles over.

"That it is for being an insensitive imbecile." I move to kick the second girl in the shins:

"And that is for being an insolent little—" A pair of strong arms grab me from behind, restraining me so that my foot never makes contact. I try to lash out at the girls again but the person holding me drags me away. I can feel half the village's eyes on me. I twist around and recognise my captor as the women I was talking to before.

"Get off me!" I say through gritted teeth.

"Griffin, you're just angry that he's gone. You need to calm down."

"I DO NOT need to calm down!" I yell, further illustrating her point.

"You need to go home and get some rest."

"GET OFF ME!" I scream, breaking out of her firm grasp. I take one quick glance around the fire—everyone staring at me in shocked silence—before turning and sprinting off into the woods.

000

I run and run, snow crunching underneath my feet, each movement sending unwanted memories exploding into my head: Jack's obsession with going everywhere barefoot, even in the middle of winter; the way that he climbs—climbed trees, shimming up the trunk then swinging between branches, yelling at the squirrels.

I keep running, my feet taking me automatically to that place. I burst out of the shaded memories of the trees and am confronted with the sight of the lake, the huge expanse of blank white ice, overshadowed by the rocky cliff I know so well. The sight of a break in the ice, a black void of menacing water sends another shot of pain roaring through my raging head.

Against my better judgement, I walk out onto the ice, heading for the dark patch of water. I look down and see the crack, the faults that were fatal. The ice begins to crunch underfoot as I get nearer to the hole. Closer, closer. I look down into the dark, dark water. The moon and my scared face are reflected there. Parts of the same vigil of mourning.

"Where are you, Jack? Where the bloody hell are you?" I whisper, my breath coming in clouds and my tears falling like rain on the water. I shift my foot. And hear the ice crack. Shift it again. The ice cracks again, louder this time. I begin to move, as the ice rents apart, and I sprint away from the cracks, which are beginning to catch up to me. They stop just as I reach the safety of the snowy ground.

That sound is probably the last thing that Jack every heard. The cracking of ice. The breach of a life. The breaking of hearts. His skates are still on the bank where he left them. Went out onto the lake barefoot as usual. I see the snowman he must have built for his sister before they went skating. The stones they used for the smile have slipped off the face, leaving only a blank visage.

And I feel something inside me breaks.

"Are you happy now Jack? Are you freaking happy?" I yell at the moon, which is staring coolly down at me.

"They're all back there crying for you. Your mother, your sister. They think you're gone." I scream louder.

"Answer me Jack! You've gone and left us the least you could do would be to tell me why!" My voice breaks, and I become aware of the freezing tears streaming and solidifying on my face.

"Why Jack?" I whisper. "Why?" I slip sideways to the ground, my burning hand contributing to the roaring pain in my head and my heart. My head is cradled by the snow. Its dampness seeps through my thin clothes, drenching me to the soul.

The last thing I see is a figure silhouetted by the moon.


	3. Chapter 2

**A/N: Hi guys! So here's chapter two! Hope you like it and please review! This is my first fanfic so yeah!**

**Teresa12 xx**

* * *

I wake looking up at wooden ceiling. My clothes are still wet, and when I move my head I feel melted snow dislodge from my hair and trickle down the back of my neck. I'm still wearing the clothes I wore last night… _last night_. And it all comes rushing back.

I double over, and rest my head against my knees, waiting until the storm of emotion has settled somewhat. It's then I remember the late night trip to the lake. I sit bolt upright, my head spinning as well as the room around me. Judging by the light seeping underneath the cloth hanging over the window, it's nearing dawn. I look slowly around the room, more cold trickling down my neck with every movement. I know this room. It's Jack's.

In one movement I've thrown off the bed covers and stood up, my bare feet freezing on the wooden floor. I can see my shoes, haphazardly thrown against the wall, and I tug the boots on, which are remarkably dry after being drenched in snow and ice last night.

I open the door quickly, knowing that it creaks eerily if eased open. The house is completely silent as I peer up and down the corridor, the light filtering gently through the grimy window at one end. I creep out of the bedroom, closing the door softly behind me, and proceed to hop down the hallway, avoiding the boards that creak. The fire has partially burnt out in the grate, a few small flames still gnawing a huge log Emma must have put on the night before. The living room looks precisely as it always does, Jack's articles of clothing scattered everywhere, Emma's prized collection of books in the book case beside the fireplace, and Alison's doll propped up against the side of the arm chair. Their wood burner stove in the corner in the room looks cold and desolate. A reflection of what we are.

I take one last look at their family belongings scattered around the room, the evidence of a family that will never be the same and I close the door behind me.

* * *

The morning has the usual fresh smell that snow brings, but at once I can smell the wood smoke from the communal fire last night. I start to walk briskly towards the village centre, the fresh snow crunching underfoot. When I arrive at the fireside, all the people around look up for an instant and an icy silent descends. Then just as abruptly as it started, everyone looks down hurriedly and the buzz of uneasy conversation regains momentum.

I walk over to the pot on the fire and pour myself some hot gruel for breakfast, sitting awkwardly down on one of the logs surrounding the fire pit. One of kinder women in the village smiles at me and says:

"Find your way home last night alright?"  
"Um…what?" I say ungracefully, sputtering on the too hot gruel scalding my tongue.

"Did you get home? Mrs Clyde said you ran off to the lake and didn't come back."

"Oh…um, yes I got back alright thanks." I say awkwardly, running my fingers through my tangled and damp brown hair, trying not to look suspicious. How_ did_ I get home last night? "Was Emma here most of last night?" I ask, trying to sound steady, but my voice comes out slighter higher than usual.

"Yes, she was; the poor thing. Took her home and into bed, I did, along with little Alison. Such a lovely family but so tragic…" she trails off and moves away to fill the bowls of more people wanting breakfast.

"Oh God…" I mutter. So if Emma definitely didn't get me into their house…then who did? I down the rest of my bowl in one mouthful, gagging on the hotness, and slam it down onto the table beside the fire, and start running off towards the woods again, prompting some strange looks from many people gathered around the fire feeling a weird sense of déjà vu.

I keep running, this time my destination very clear in my head: the lake. I finally reach it and the sun peeking out from behind the cliff overlooking the lake blinds my eyes, which are used to the darkness of the forest. I stop for a few seconds, until the coloured lights obscuring my vision fade. I walk over to the side of the lake. The fresh snow and icy weather has frozen the water where the break in the ice once was, and there is a fine layer of snow coating the entire lake's surface. I lean closer over the lake straining to see what I think I'm seeing.

There are footprints. Footprints leading away from the place where Jack fell through the ice. Footprints that just originate in the middle of the lake—a _frozen_ lake—and continue to the shore. Then, as I look up into the dawn sun, I see a figured silhouetted against the burning light. The sudden shock makes me fall to my knees, but my eyes remain locked on the figure. The figure seems to be wearing a cape of some sort and is barefoot, with very messy hair. I can hear my heartbeat in my ears and my hands have started shaking, and it's not from the cold. Suddenly the figure moves, and I have to blink several times before I can register what I'm seeing—and even then I don't really believe it. The figure is flying—_flying_—towards the surface of the lake, limbs spread out, holding a misshapen stick. Just as I think he (or is it she?) is going to hit the ice, the figure alters course and lands in very undignified manner, stumbling and skittering, until coming to halt close to the shore, stick in hand.

And I know immediately. It's Jack.

* * *

It's Jack… but not Jack. His once brown hair is now pure white, but just as messy and his eyes are an icy blue instead of their warm brown. His skin was always pale but now it's as pale as the snow around his feet. But his clothes are exactly the same: the cape and the shirt—and those bloody _pants—_and of course no shoes.

"Are you done staring at me?" And I could have had heart attack then and there.

"Jack…" I whisper. His smirk fades slightly.

"How do you know my name?" he asks, looking suspicious.

"Jack…what _happened_ to you?" I say, louder this time, fear starting to creep into the edges of my vision.

"Nothing happened to me. And _how do you know my name_?" he says again, starting to walk across the ice towards me. Wherever his bare feet touch the ice, spirals of silvery frost emanate. This is seriously starting to freak me out.

"_Nothing happened to you?_ Your hair is white, your eyes are blue and you can freaking fly! And you're telling me _nothing_ happened?" I half-shout at him.

"I was always like this." he says calmly, looking at me evenly through those cool eyes.

"_Always like this?_ Jack, you had brown hair! And brown eyes! And last time I checked you had to walk everywhere, not fly." I say, my fear coming roaring back.

"How do you know what I was like? There was nothing before this! And again: _how do you know my name?_" He says, more forcefully this time. He's crossed the ice now, and standing directly in front of me, which somehow makes it worse. I can see he's still Jack, that much is evident by his arrogance, but at the same time I can't help but notice the hair and the eyes. Oh and the flying.

"You don't remember?" I say in desperation. Then it hits me. That's exactly it. He _doesn't _remember. Anything. Including me. I stumble away from him.

"Jack…what are you?" I whisper fearfully.

"What do you—"

"Jack… _what are you_?

"I'm not—"

"Jack, if you're not human, then what are you?"


	4. Chapter 3

"I don't know," he says quietly. I keep looking at him.

"I don't know," he repeats, louder this time. "No one ever bothers to tell me anything."

"Well, join the club." I say, sitting down in the snow of the side of the lake. Jack sits down beside me and I try not to pay attention to the fact that every time he moves his feet, the snow freezes into solid ice.

"I just… woke up and saw the moon. And I was exactly like this. I could fly… though not very well," he smiles sheepishly. "And the moon told me my name. Jack Frost." He looks up at me and his eyes are enough to make my heart freeze.

"There are two flaws with that. One: the moon doesn't talk. And two: your name is not Jack Frost, its Jack Overland and —"

"I am Jack Frost, the winter spirit and I have absolutely no idea who you are." I feel as if all the breath has been knocked out of me. I stare at him, his features not changing the slightest bit; cold and distant.

"I am the winter spirit and no one can see me unless they believe in me. So how can you see—" he trails off, knowing the obvious answer.

"Yes Jack! I bloody believe in you! I believe that you still remember—"

"I've told you that I don't remember anything!"

"Really Jack?" I shout, my anger rising and I've jumped to my feet, facing Jack, who is still holding that stupid stick.

"So you don't remember that you have a family? Or maybe you do remember, but you're too scared to go tell them you're alive because you're afraid that they won't believe in you." I shout. If I wasn't half-blinded by the morning light, I could swear that Jack's eyes are full of tears. He's staring at me and I can see that the hand holding the stick is shaking.

"Well I have news for you, _Jack Frost_. Your family believe in you more than anyone. At this moment your little sister is sitting on you front porch crying over her dead brother and screaming about how he died saving her. So if you—"

"If I haven't visited my family it's because I can't remember them. Not because I don't love them." Both of us are full on crying by now, and Jack's tears are freezing on his face, and mine are streaming into my hair, and my cheeks feel red and raw, just like my heart.

"I want to remember everything. I really do. I want to know what it was like to be… _human._ I want that more than anything. I want to know who I was." He lowers his head, looking at his feet, like he always does when he's nervous. "But I can't think about my past life now—"

"Past life?" And I finally thought that he had seen sense. "Jack, it's not your _past life._ Past life implies that it's gone!" I shout at him. There is a moment of silence. "We're all still here, Jack." I whisper. "We're all still here." My voice cracks and I turn away, tears blurring my vision of the frozen lake.

I hear a sigh behind me, and soft footsteps on the snow.

"Look, I'm sorry that I can't remember anything—I'm really, really sorry. But I—if you meet me here at midnight, then I'll try…to explain everything." he says softly.

I don't even look back. Just keep walking.

Keep walking.

* * *

When I open the door, the first thing I am confronted with is a bustling aunt and four children. Four _crying _children. Just what I need. The fire crackling is merrily in the grate, a dazzling contradiction to what is happening in the room.

I exchange looks with my aunt who mouths "Go." I nod and get out of there; stopping briefly in the room I share with three of my cousins to grab my bag. I trudge down the main street of the village; pointedly ignoring all of the looks cast my way, probably caused by my outburst at those girls last night. I hope at least one of them has a lovely bruise.

I continue until the buildings start to thin out, then turn down a lane to the left, bordered by trees that hang overheard like a guard of honour. I let myself into the stables allowing the blissful silence to press on my ears. I dump my bag in the tack room, grab a wooden bucket full of feed and start slopping it into every horse's trough, for once not caring about the different amounts. The horses give me knowing looks, as if they can sense not only fear but every single other bloody emotion I seem to be feeling right now.

I am halfway through mucking out one of the stalls, my hand-me-down boots already covered in mud, when I hear footsteps ringing through the small space. I look up, my hands resting on the splintering wooden handle of the pitchfork.

"You're late." says Ana, surveying me indifferently.

"I've been here for over an hour." Actually it could be tomorrow for all I know, but it was just an estimate.

"But you said you'd be here at dawn, and I saw you walking across the yard only a little while ago when I was out in the paddock riding." She says cynically. Oh, she takes her job way too seriously, this girl

"Yeah well I had a rough night." I say, breaking eye-contact and trying to drown out the sound of her annoying voice by seeing how loudly I can bang my pitchfork against the ground whilst still looking as if I'm doing something productive.

"I don't care. As head of stable I have the right to—"

"You have the right to what? Fire me? And you know full you can't do that. I was assigned to this job and you can't take away assignments, not unless you want to go see the Council again." Ana goes bright red and looks annoyed.

"Thought not. So next time don't make empty threats." I say, looking at the straw stuck to my boot to hide my overly satisfied smirk.

"What makes you think I won't go to the Council? You are a danger to the village's horses! You are such a nuisance anyway," she scoffs. My eyebrows shoot up at this.

"Yes, I was such a hindrance when I coxed the horse _you _spooked out of that snow drift last week." I say sarcastically. Ana loses her smirk. "And I happen to have it on very reliable intelligence that there was a certain incident that may restrict you in the terms of going to the Council anytime soon."

She looks doubtful. "And what intelligence would that be? Jack Overland's?"

The pitchfork slips out of my grasp and lands with a muffled thump on the dirt floor. In movement I have crossed the space between us, and shoved her up against the wall, my forearm against her throat.

"Don't you dare say _anything_ about him."  
"Oh yes. I forgot that he's… how do you say it? Passed on. Or maybe fell through, is the more accurate term."

"Keep talking and you're going to regret it." She looks at me; a silent challenge.

"Of course, he left behind poor Griffin. You were always there for him weren't you? Always ready to take part in his antics. Hanging upside down from trees, burying yourselves in the snow. It was always you two, wasn't it? Many people even supposed—"

"Supposed what? It may come as a shock to you, but I couldn't care less about anyone's suppositions." I turn away and finally take away my forearm from her neck, leaving a red mark. It was a miracle that she was even able to talk, let alone breathe.

"Oh but you cared about Jack's." I freeze, my face turned away from her, my knuckles gripping the pitchfork so hard they turn white.

"Stop behaving like you're superior to me!" I growl. "You're barely a winter older than me."

"But sixteen winters as opposed to fifteen can make all the difference." she snarls back. "Especially in assignment rankings."

"And so can connections to member on the Council." I say, without looking up. "Surprising they haven't kicked you out of this position since they found out."

"Oh come on, Griffin. I know you've been envious of me, ever since you were thirteen, and got stuck as the _stable hand_ despite the fact you were the best rider in the village. And I got the stable head position. Too bad, Griffin."

That is it.

"You insulting, insolent, immature—"

"Immature what, Griffin?" she says sharply. "I may not have the right to fire you, Griffin," she says slowly, regaining her composure, "but I can regulate your workload."

And there goes my sarcastic smile.

After spending the entire day doing laps around the entire stable property to 'exercise' the horses, shovelling what felt like several tonnes of straw and walking the entire way into town to get more feed, only to return and have Ana tell me she miscalculated the amounts, resulting in me having to walk the entire way there and back again, I am pretty exhausted.

So I traipse back in to town, my boots covered in god-knows-what, my hair all over my face and my bag slung over one aching shoulder, and make an instant beeline for the campfire. I dump my stuff, and grab a bowl of dinner, which seems to be some type of stew, and seat myself as far away from everyone as physically possibly. Some people are still giving me 'that' look, but most have probably condemned my actions as that of a grief-stricken girl or totally forgotten about me, which is more probable.

The stew is good and hot, and in the end I throw away the spoon and drink it straight from the bowl, peering over its wooden edge at the rest of the campsite, silhouetted against the firelight. I lean my head back against a log and cross my legs, which protest valiantly, and survey the comings and goings of the villages.

The people who are assigned to cooking and serving are busy giving bowls to basically everyone in the village. Groups of kids who look to be about thirteen are huddled together, looking anxious. I ponder of this for a while, before remembering that it's Assignment Day in about a week.

The days when the worst you had to worry about was getting a bad Assignment.

* * *

Jack and I sat tensely at the back of the village hall. I was fidgeting non-stop, so eventually Jack handed me a pebble from his pocket because it was annoying him so much. I turned it over and over in my hands, the list of names and assignments washing over me and I wasn't hearing a thing. He was looking at his feet, the only outward sign of his nervousness.

Eventually they reached Jack's name. I had to nudge him in the stomach to get him to look up and his head snapped up, brown eyes alert.

"Jack Overland." said the dreary voice of the Council Head. He fished around in the bucket full of objects signifying different positions. He finally drew up out a bundle of straw. "Stables." I breathed out. We both slumped back in our seats. Jack continued to look at his feet, his shaking hands the only evidence of his disappointment.

The Assignments kept on going. I never realised how annoying it was having a last name near the bottom of the alphabet. I didn't think that there were so many people my age in the village. Of course there were the odd few being reassigned but the majority of the benches in the hall were taken up by nervous thirteen year-olds. Finally they reach my section of the role.

"Griffin Tarrow." Jack glanced over at me. I attempted a nervous smile back which came out more like a grimace. The Head rooted around in the bucket, before pulling out a feather. "Hunting." I hunched my shoulders over and stared at the floor. Hunting. Great

After what seemed like forever, the Assignments were finally over. We streamed out of the hall and into the snow. I walked briskly down the street until I heard the sound of light footsteps on the snow. I looked up to see a pair of brown eyes staring at me.

"Put some shoes on, Jack." I said, looking down at his pale feet, which looked blue against the snow.

"You don't like hunting do you?" he asked.

"No."

"You like stables 'cause you ride everywhere, right?"

"Yes"

"You're upset."

"No I'm not."

"That wasn't a question." He paused looking down the snow-obscured street. "We could swap."

"What?" I spluttered.

"We could swap. Assignments. You know, since I got stables which you want, and you got hunting which I want."

"That's not allowed."

"Yeah but no one will know. They don't keep records. They pretty much just expect everyone to listen and then turn up to their Assignment."

"Despite that, we're still technically breaking the rules."

"And name two reasons why I would do it if we _weren't_ breaking the rules."

"Because you want to hunt and because you know I want the stable Assignment."  
"And why is that second reason valid?"

"Because you know that if you didn't swap then I would do this." I smirked.

"Do what?" said Jack innocently.

"This." And I chucked a snowball at his face.

* * *

I wake with a start. I stare up at the moon, relishing the familiarity of the dream and trying to drive away the coldness waking brought.

I judge it to be about midnight. The fire has all but died down to a patch of embers, and the nearby windows are black with sleep.

I remember a promise made to me at dawn. And with a sigh, I start to walk towards the woods at midnight.


	5. Chapter 4

The moon is out and reflecting eerily off the snow. My footsteps crunching on the ground are the only sound echoing through the vast forest. My breath comes in white puffs in front of me, and I stick my hands deeper into my pockets, my face going numb from the still cold.

The moon shines through the cage of the bare tree branches, creating thin criss-crossing shadows on the snow. It's a miracle that Jack never got frostbite from going around barefoot all the time. As I walk out into the clearing, the moon refracting off the frozen lake and snow is blinding and almost pure white. The only spaces of blackness are the blank vertical wall of the cliff, rising menacingly above the lake, and a figure, standing alone on the lakes edge, silhouetted by the moonlight.

I stop suddenly in the snow for a moment, struggling to remember where I've seen the image imprinted before. I walk forward a few more steps, my eyes fixed on the figure standing by the lakeside, still unmoving. The moon continues to shine brightly, and my mind continues to try to remember. I look at my feet for a moment, at the cold snow seeping its frost into my shoes. _Cold_. I look up again at the figure and then at the moon, which leaves bright spots all over my vision. Then it clicks.

I start walk briskly towards Jack, who is wearing the exact same things he was wearing this morning; still barefoot and holding—what is the deal with that bloody stick? He turns around when he hears me coming, and his face if wasn't in shadows I would have sworn that a brief look of relief flashed across his face, replaced just as quickly by his slightly defiant, slightly disengaged expression he always seems to be wearing these days.

I waste no breath, merely march straight up to him, so fiercely he takes a step backwards and nearly falls over. I still have to look up just slightly to meet his eyes—why does he have to be taller than me—which are their usual cold blue. I have to keep from doing a double-take every time I see those eyes. Almost fifteen years of brown eyes doesn't fade easily in a memory. Jack looks down at me, rather surprised.

"That first night… when you died, I passed out here. And when I woke up I was in your bed, in your house." I continue to stare at him. His features remain unchanged, but I notice the twitch that he gets in his lip whenever he's trying hard not to give anything away.

"I assumed your mother found me or something but one of the villagers helped her back to house and stayed with her almost all night. And the last thing that I saw before I fainted was a figure silhouetted by the moonlight." I turn and look at the lake, biting my lip.

"It was you, wasn't it? You carried me home." Jack looks at his feet. He doesn't say anything. "Jack?"

He still doesn't look up, but says: "I was sitting in one of the trees. Just observing everything. And you came along. You were screaming and crying and running on the ice and then eventually you collapsed in the snow. And…" He pauses for a moment. "And I came down from the tree and I didn't think that you would wake up and I knew you would freeze out here so… yes, Griffin, I… I carried you home."

My heart goes cold when he says my name, and I'm grateful he's still looking at his bare feet so he can't see my face. I'm surprised that I can even say this next question but I have to know.

"How did you know where home was?" At this his head snaps up, and I'm surprised to see that his face, which was distant and blank at the start of our conversation, has softened, and his eyes—despite the colour—almost look like the eyes that the old Jack used to have: gentle and playful.

"I don't know." He says, looking out towards the lake. "I just flew, and I just ended up there. It's as if I just knew…instinctively."

I step away from him, pacing up and down the snowy bank of the lake, thinking.

"Griffin…" comes Jack's voice from behind me. I whip around.

"You know my name!" I say, my brain just starting to piece it all together. "But I never told you."

"I think you did, Griffin." says Jack, looking at me with his typical dubious expression: eyes narrowed and mouth quirked into an arrogant grin.

"No I didn't. Do you know what that means?" I say, excitedly.

"That you have a horrible memory." There's the old Jack again. Every time he says something like that it's like all the breath has been knocked out of me. Like just as I was starting the grasp the concept of Jack being gone, another memory surfaces and I'm right back to square one.

"No! That _your _memory is still there! Knowing my name, where you lived! It's coming back Jack! It's still there." I stare at him, my heart beating so fast and loud I'm surprised he can't hear it.

He turns away and mutters something. "What'd you say?" I ask. He turns back to me and that expression has returned: distance.

"What if…" He looks at the lake again then back at me. His face is blank of emotion, but his eyes belie how much pain this is causing him. "What if I don't want my memories back?"

I am stunned into silence. Then I manage to whisper: "Why wouldn't you want them back?" Jack looks straight at me and this time doesn't break his gaze.

"Because they hurt too much, Griffin. It would be better just to never remember at all, than to have to carry them around with you, a constant agonising reminder of the things you can't have." He must've seen my expression and the fact that I've opened my mouth to interrupt, because he says: "Don't even think about saying that there are things I can have. Half the people in the village wouldn't even see me. I'm hurting the other half more by coming back. Giving them false hope that things can go back the way they were? Well, they can't. Ever. Because of this."

He moves his crooked stick across the ground, and the snow instantly freezes to ice.

"And by going back I'm only hurting them and me. I'm immortal and I'm going to have to stay this way forever. And some wounds don't heal with time." He raises his voice and now his entire visage is a reflection of his pain. "And I'm going to have to sit by, and watch all of you, grow up and live happy lives. I'm going to have to sit by as your lives taper to their end. I'm going to have to sit and watch you die! And I can't do a thing about it. And that is going to hurt me far more than anything in my eternal existence ever will." He keeps staring straight at me, and I can see that his whole body is shaking with emotion.

He finally breaks my gaze, and walks away a few metres, sitting down on the very edge of the frozen lake, and using his big stick to draw spirals on the glassy surface. I glance behind me to the forest, as someone might magically be lurking there with the answers to all of this, then walk over and sit down next to Jack, stretching my legs out so that my heels just rest on the edge of the ice.

"You know, I was thinking—" I say.

"Thinking what?" Jack interrupts listlessly. I resist the urge to glare at him.

"That you may not be the only one. Like this, you know, immortal spirits and stuff."

"Perhaps." Jack replies. There is a very awkward silence, only broken by the cracking sounds caused by Jack's staff dragging along the ice and creating frost.

"How did you become a spirit? I mean, like what happened?" I ask, searching for something to fill the silence. With the old Jack you would never have been searching for something to say; he had an uncanny knack of guessing things before you said them, or just in general finding the most random things to say to keep conversation going.

He looks out over the lake with a lost look on his face. "I just woke up—but underneath the water, and I could see the moonlight through a hole in the ice. And then it was like this…this invisible force pulled me up out of the water and I was standing on the ice." He pauses, twirling the staff between his thin fingers.

"Then it was just like I knew my name was Jack Frost and that I could control the snow and wind and ice. So I picked up the staff and I realised that I could fly. Though I did smash straight into the cliff the first time." He smiles dryly. "So if there were other… other spirits like me, then…?" He trails off.

"Well, yes. You probably don't remember—you _definitely_ don't remember—but there was this old man, Ana's grandfather, unfortunately for him…" I smile. Jack is staring at me blankly. "Never mind. Anyway, most people thought that he was stark raving mad. Always screaming about some demon or spirit of black, 'always as dark as pitch' he used to say. And he used to scream about the 'spirit of fear' and wave his arms around him as if to fend off some invisible demon." I look at Jack. He just stares back. In any other situation it would be comical.

"Okay, maybe the spirit of fear isn't one of the best friends you could make, but it's a start." I say shrugging.

"Do you know where this man is now?" asks Jack.

"In some random hut on the very outskirts of the village."

"We should go there." says Jack, that old determination coming back to his eyes. I look away briefly and stare up at the full moon, wondering what role it has to play in all of this, if any.

I avert my eyes from the sky to look back at Jack, but the moment before I do so I swear I see a shadow of the darkest black pass over the brightness of the moon.


	6. Chapter 5

**A/N: Hi everyone! Thanks so much for reading my story, especially to the people who reviewed it, because it seriously makes my day! I may not be able to update as often now, because school is getting ridiculously hectic! Anyway thanks for reading and let me know what you think!**

**Teresa xx**

* * *

"Do have any idea where that house even is?" Jack asks, walking lightly behind me and freezing a tree every few metres or so. He was hovering above me before, but I pulled him down because he kept dropping snow on my head.

"Nope," I say, without bothering to turn around. "But I wasn't about to ask Ana." Jack, waves his stick, causing light snow to start falling around us.

"Really?" I ask in disbelief, turning around. "You may be able to walk around barefoot in the midst of winter, by some of us get cold." I pull my hat further down over my ears, my long plait sticking out the back like a tail.

"Come on. You've got to love snow!" he teases.

"Yep. Totally." I say, pushing a birch branch out of the way and letting it go so it smacks Jack in the face. He frowns at me, then speeds up to walk next to me.

"But why wouldn't you ask Ana?" he asks, "It would save us having to walk around in the forest for ages while it's snowing."

"Well it doesn't _have _to be snowing…that was a choice thing." I point out. Jack rolls his blue eyes. Another stab of pain hits me as I remember how he used to do that, except his eyes were brown. "Anyway you don't even know who Ana is."

"True."

"And you don't want to."

"I can't judge that but okay." He pauses. "But I take it you don't like her very much, or else you definitely would have asked her where it was."

"Exactly." At that moment I see a clearing in the trees up ahead and smoke rising above the canopy. And I know that finally we have found our destination. I turn to Jack and I know that he's seen it too.

"Okay: so bear in mind that he probably won't be able to see you. And please don't make much noise." Jack looks at me.

"I know, I know. You've told me about five times."

"And I'm pretty sure you weren't listening to around four of them." We walk out into the clearing, to see a small wooden hut with a thatch roof, and smoke billowing from the stone chimney, and few wooden posts stuck in the ground it, obviously stakes for vegetables buried underneath the snow.

I walk briskly up to the door, and before I knock I hesitate slightly. If it is true—if there are other people, _spirits_, like Jack, then—well, if he can't remember then he probably won't want much to do with me. So as much as I do want Jack not to be alone, _I _don't want to be alone either.

"What?" says Jack, looking at me concernedly.

"Nothing." I shake my head to rid it off the selfish thoughts and rap sharply on the door with my left hand.

"What if no one's home?" whispers Jack right in my ear. I jump back in surprise, straight into him, and he grabs me before I fall into the snow. His hand grips my arm and his other arm is around my back. For moment we just stare at each other, then Jack smiles awkwardly. I laugh nervously, then stop suddenly as I hear the door creak open.

I look up and see an old man staring at us. Jack still doesn't let go of me, which is good, because we're both pretty much frozen to the spot and I would fall over if he did.

"Um…hi." says Jack, not taking his eyes of the old man's face, which shows no surprise whatsoever.

"I told you not to talk." I mutter through gritted teeth, forcing a smile.

"Too late now." Jack mutters back, following my lead and faking a smile too, which looks more like he's in the process of having his toes frozen off. I clear my throat and glance over at Jack, who gets the hint and pulls me back to my feet again.

"Hi." I say, brushing my hands on my coat. "I'm—"

"I know who you are. And who the young man standing next to you is." I look sideways, just to check that it really is Jack standing there and he hasn't been replaced by some other boy from the village.

"Come in." He turns and goes back inside.

"Thanks." I smile and stand there, and Jack pushes me forward and over the threshold, giving me look as if to say: "I didn't really need to be quiet."

"Sit." says the old man shortly. I take a seat on an armchair that seems to be one of two in the room, but it's hard to tell since there are papers piled everywhere, along with things like a pair of skates and a pair of skis. Jack perches awkwardly on the arm of the chair beside me.

"Tea?" he asks.

"No thank-you." I stutter. He looks inquiringly at Jack, who is busy observing the hut. I elbow him.

"Hmm? Oh um no thanks. Hot drinks aren't really my thing." The man nods as if he totally understands, which he probably does, given that he can see Jack quite clearly. He busies himself getting tea in the kitchen which is in one corner of the room. This room seems to function as the entire house. There is a bed in one corner, a woodstove and a few hooks and baskets for hanging crockery in the opposite one, a rickety table and two armchairs. I can see what seems to be the doorway to a mudroom off to one side of the woodstove. The fire place is in the wall that the bed is pushed against, which doesn't seem very safe, a thin strip of stonework marks the chimney.

I look at Jack, whose long thin feet still touch the ground despite the fact that the arm of the chair is quite high. He is still holding the stick.

"Couldn't you have left that outside?" I whisper. The old man is whistling whilst stocking the stove with wood, and clanging a metal mug around loudly as he attempts to find tea leaves.

"What?" Jack replies, lowering his head to hear me properly over the clanging.

"Your stick. Couldn't you have left that outside?" I repeat.

"It's not a stick. It's a staff." he says, sounding as if it makes a huge difference. I clench my fists on my knees as I think how much it is like the old Jack to say that.

"Just because it has magical powers doesn't make it more than a stick." He leans in closer, with a mock serious expression on his face.

"Griffin, this 'stick' controls basically all the snow, wind and ice in the world. It also enables me to fly and if I feel the need to, freeze your hand off." He smiles. "Therefore, it is very much a staff." He leans back, a very satisfied expression on his face; as if he just proved that the world was round.

The old man has finished making his cup of tea, and sits down in the armchair across from us.

"So." he begins. "Before we talk more in depth about why you have come, I suppose it would do to have proper introductions." His formal tone catches me off-guard, and I stutter a bit as I reply:

"Oh, um yes. I'm Griffin Tarrow. And this is Jack Overland—" Jack gives me a look. "Or Jack Frost as he likes to be called now."

"The Man in the Moon chose a new spirit then. Ice and snow. Lovely" says the man, clasping his hands in front of him, his cup of tea balancing precariously on a stack of books beside him.

"And you are?" Jack prompts. I give him a looks that plainly says: 'manners!' It's exactly like old times, Jack doing something stupid or outrageous, and me standing by scolding and being disapproving, before being dragged into it too.

The old man just laughs though. "Nestor."

"Okay, um, Mr Nestor—"

"Just Nestor."

"Right. Nestor, we've come about—" He waves his hand dismissively.

"I know why you've come." Jack gives me an amused smirk and I glare back at him. "You've come to find out if there are other spirits like Frosty here." Jack looks appalled at the nickname.

"Yes." I say, a bit lost for words. This man—Nestor—is more of a mind-reader than Jack is.

"Well, to make a long story short: there are." My fists clench again, but I force myself to relax when I see the intrigued expression on Jack's face. "But they're not all good. Of course there are always going to be dark spirits, otherwise there would be no darkness in the world. Spirits like death, pain… _fear_."

Jack glances at me. "And what might be the name of this… this fear spirit?"

The old man snorts. "Fear demon, more like. And his name—well, his name… is Pitch Black."

"That's the name you used to shout sometimes in the village." I say. This man doesn't seem half-crazy to me, but then again I liked Ana at first, so my first impressions aren't something to judge by.

"Yes. No one there was ever aware of him. But he was there alright. Creeping through the houses, the barns, the stables. Even the fireside. They all felt that he was there. They just didn't know it was him." The fire flickers, eerily.

"You never know. He may be in this very room." The old man's voice is low and he's speaking slowly; the entire effect is quite creepy. Suddenly his eyes glow pure black, causing me to lurch backward and Jack to nearly fall off the chair. A door slams shut somewhere and the fire flickers violently again.

Then just as quickly as it appeared, the burden of dread in my stomach disappears. The old man's eyes return to normal and the fire begins burning steadily again. Jack looks at me, his eyes a mask of fear and dread.

"So…are there any good spirits?" he asks.

"Sure there are." replies Nestor. "You didn't think that they were all bad, did ya?"

Jack looks as if this is questionable. "So there are good spirits."

"Yes." says the man. "Protectors of the children of the world, and their beliefs and such and such. Don't believe a word of it myself."

"And what are these spirits called?" Jack presses.

"The Guardians." he replies.


	7. Chapter 6

Jack raises his eyebrows at me. Neither of us have ever heard of these so-called 'Guardians'

"And, where might we find these Guardians?" Jack asks. His eyes are full of hope and an expression that I've never seen before.

"Everywhere. North Pole, Mongolia, Australia, random sand islands that like to move around." Jack raises an eyebrow.

"But…if you want to the headquarters of Guardians try the North Pole." Nestor amends, seeing the confused look on both our faces. "And now if you don't mind, I have work to do."

Jack and I stand up, clearly dismissed. Jack goes to waltz straight out the door, but I grab his arm and force him to stop.

"Thank-you for the information, Nestor." I say, smiling. Jack looks at me and rolls his eyes. Nestor grunts in ascent.

"Bye." says Jack, heading towards the door. Nestor turns back towards us.

"If you're going to the Guardians, you need to be quick. Pitch makes it his goal to find any new spirits. And turn them dark."

* * *

Jack paces up and down the bank of the lake, playing with a snowball he made earlier.

"Why can't we go now?" he says in frustration, and chucks the ball at a tree, where it smashes into a heap of snow at the bottom of the trunk.

"You know why." I say, shortly. "Why do you have to be so impatient?"

"I'm not impatient." I raise an eyebrow. "Just…restless." I laugh. He balances his staff upright on the ground and crouches on top of it.

"Stop showing off." He smiles arrogantly.

"I'm not showing off." He says. "Believe it or not, this is actually a very comfortable position." He pulls the hood of his poncho over his wild hair, and jumps back to the ground again, leaning on his staff and resting his head against it.

"Can we go?" Jack says again.

"We have to wait until it is completely dark. People do get suspicious if they see someone flying through the air." I stand up, brushing my freezing hands on my pants. "So about an hour."

Jack sighs in exasperation. "What, you've never had to wait in your life?" I say, annoyed.

Jack looks at me. "Not in the life I can remember, no." There is a silence between us. Jack glances up from his feet, an idea forming in his eyes.

"So we have an hour to kill."

"Yep."

"I can teach you how to skate." He says, looking hopeful.

"I know how to skate." I say, twisting my braid around my fingers.

"Not my way you don't" He says mischievously, pointing to his feet.

"Oh no. No. There is _no _way that I am going to be taking off my shoes and stepping onto _ice_." I say, backing away. "You may be immune to the cold, but I however, have my limits."

"Come on Griffin! Just once! And it will stop me complaining!" he grins at me.

"Who says your complaining was annoying me?" I say, crossing my arms and staring at Jack.

"It's really obvious." He winks and then looks serious. "Please?"

I sigh exasperatedly. "Once and once only. Understood?" Jack smiles. I just stand there, then sit down on the snowy ground and take off my damp boots and the several layers of socks I have on underneath. I stand up again, the frost ground and cold biting into my feet.

Jack puts down his staff near my shoes and steps out onto the ice. Reluctantly, I follow him, beginning to lose feeling in my feet.

"This was a really bad idea." I mutter. Jack just smirks.

"It's just like normal ice-skating, except without skates." Jack says.

"So really it's absolutely nothing like normal skating."

"Pretty much." Jack admits. "Okay," he says, moving to stand opposite me. "Grab my hands." He stretches out his skinny arms and hands with the long fingers that I know so well towards me.

"Why?" I ask.

"Just do it." I roll my eyes, grasp his hands and look up at him. He's staring at our clasped hands, as if lost in some deep memory, which in all probability he could be.

"Jack." I prompt.

"Right." He jerks back into the present and looks up at me. "So just skate normally, and I'll steady you."

"Okay…" I say skeptically, and begin to skate forward, moving my feet exactly as I would if I had skates on, except I can feel to the cool and glassy surface directly underneath my feet.

I move forward slowly, and Jack moves backwards, skating perfectly in his bare feet. I slip forward, my feet losing feeling by the minute, and Jack grabs me before I fall, shivers of warmth emanating from where his hands are fixed around my waist. Our momentum has run out, and we're left standing on the ice. For a moment we stare at each other, green eyes into icy blue, until Jack smirks and says:

"Keep going, Grif." I start to smile, then freeze as I register the nickname. No one ever calls me that, _no one_ except for Jack. Jack notices the change in my expression, and the tears that have sprung to my eyes.

"Grif, what's the matter?" he asks looking concernedly at me. His eyebrows furrow into his typical confusion, and his eyes narrow, as if trying to read something from afar.

"Don't call me that!" I scream. The emotions inside me threaten to burst out in an explosion that could devastate everything around, me most of all. I swallow and look down at the ice, brushing away the tears impatiently.

"I'm sorry." I say my voice lower. "But," I raise my eyes to look at Jack. "You always used to call me that—you and no one else—and…" Here I pause, waiting for the urge to sob to lessen, "and I haven't quite come to terms the fact that you may never get your memory back—"

"Griffin, calm down. And I think the fact that I remembered that nickname means that my memories might be coming back—"

"The Guardians!" I say suddenly. Jack jumps and looks over both shoulders as if expecting the Guardians to be surveying us from atop the cliff.

"What?" Jack says, looking back at me.

"Well, they're spirits too, so maybe they experienced the same memory loss—"

"And they might have a way to get the memories back." Jack finishes, staring at me, his blue eyes glowing. But then he looks down at his feet again biting his lip and I know what is coming.

"But I told you Grif—before—that I'm not sure if I want them back." He looks up at me again, and I know that expression; the firm set of the mouth and the narrowing of his eyes that means he's trying really hard not to breakdown and start sobbing. Perhaps this is hurting him more than I ever thought.

It must be a bit of shock to wake up on the ice, have the moon tell your name, then be confronted with a hysterical girl yelling obscenities at you and then realise that actually you just died and came back to life as the winter spirit, and that the whole of your life took place in the village ten minutes away. Yeah, he has a reason to be upset.

I sigh and look away from him. Usually, I am thankful for Jack's stubbornness, as it is extremely useful in persuading other people to let us do something stupid and dangerous but it is really annoying when used against me. Together, we had some week long arguments of just not talking to each other because we were too stubborn to admit that the other was right all along.

"Well, are you going to teach me to skate or not?" I say. Jack looks up and smiles, and a silent agreement passes between us that this an argument for another day. He removes his hands from my waist, and I'm surprised at the fact that I hardly noticed that they were there throughout our argument—it just felt so…natural. Jack grabs my hands again and pulls me after him.

"That the fastest you can go Frosty?" I yell over the wind whipping around us. Jack smiles daringly and proceeds to skate faster, though how he is doing this backwards is a miracle, whereas I am barely managing this going forward.

I laugh and look at Jack, whose wild white hair is been blown around in all directions.

"That's it!" he yells, laughing. "You've got it." He lets go of my hands and I fly around the lake, the ice feeling solid beneath my numb feet, the wind rushing past me. Jack is standing by the side of the lake holding his staff, and watching me with a smile on his face.

I do a few more circuits of the lake, getting faster and faster, and even adding in a pirouette or two, before I become aware of the noise. It's like a cracking sound, seeming to follow me around the lake. I slow down slightly and look behind me, and my heart nearly stops. The ice is fracturing and the fault lines are leading straight towards me.

Jack notices it a few seconds after I do, and I can see and hear the cracks catching up to me, almost feel the bite and sting of the cold water dissolving all my feelings into numbness. Just as the ice fractures into hundreds of pieces beneath me, Jack comes flying out of nowhere and grabs me, half-dragging, half-carrying me to the bank.

The momentum caused by Jack's sudden acceleration, carries us into the bank of the lake, and I hit hard into the snow, Jack landing on top of me.

I look up at him, and he stares down at me, his elbows either side of my head, his staff on the ground level with my shoulders. His body presses against mine, and I am shaking vigorously from the cold and the shock.

We are both breathing hard, and relief is evident in Jack's eyes. After looking at each for what feels like ages I break the silence and say:

"That's… that's how you—" I trail off.

"I know," says Jack. He doesn't need to finish his sentence for us both to know what he means. We can't lose both of us to the ice. Jack looks back down at me, his eyes filled with an unreadable expression, and he seems to realise that he is lying on top of me, and hurriedly moves off me and stands up. I scramble up after him.

"That was close." I breathe. We both gaze at the Griffin-shaped hole in the surface of the ice, near the base of the cliff.

It's almost completely dark and the moon is the only light. Jack turns to me and says:

"Is it dark enough?" I survey the night sky, the stars beginning to emerge from underneath the blanket of dark blue.

"Yes." I say. I walk over to my shoes and hurriedly put them on, stamping my feet to try and get some feeling regained into my toes.

"Ready?" asks Jack, holding his staff upright.

"As I'll ever be." Jack walks over and wraps one arm around my waist, pulling me tightly into his chest. He looks down at me and says:

"North Pole, here we come."

And we shoot upwards, like stars against the background of the night sky.


	8. Chapter 7

Jack's arm is tight around my waist as the lake gets smaller and smaller and smaller and it gets colder and colder and colder, until we're virtually flying above the clouds, the cold winter air stinging my face.

Jack looks down at me, his hair whipped back in the wind and grins. He swoops down and I have to bite my tongue to stop myself gasping at the feeling in my stomach. He laughs, tilting his head back and in that one moment looks completely at home and completely _free_ and like the old Jack that I have to blink and looks down at the cloud cover below us before I can look back up at him.

Then I mentally shake myself. I've got to stop referring to him as the 'old Jack'. He's still the same person. I mean, are you still the same without your memories?

Eventually we seem to find a steady current of wind that allows us to glide across the sea of clouds below us obscuring the ground and underneath the light of the moon, which is clear and bright this high in the sky.

Jack turns to me and says: "As long as you're touching some part of me or the staff you'll stay airborne." I smile, look up at the moon. I have to consciously stop myself from shivering, not just from the cold but from being this close to Jack. As much as I try to delude myself that I have accepted the fact that his hair is like snow and his eyes are icy blue, I can't help but remember his brown hair and brown eyes, so similar to his sister's and mother's; gentle and kind.

I sigh and look up at Jack, and say: "If that's true then… um… would you mind if I just, like held your hand or something?"

Jack looks at me and I see something flicker in his eyes, but a moment he smiles and says: "Sure. This is really uncomfortable anyway."

I grab his hand and stare down at the wisps of land I can see through the solid cloud below us.

"How did you get me home that night then?" I asked him turning my head to the side to look at him. He raises his eyes from the sights below.

"I carried you." He says it as if it's the most natural thing in the world. I'm so glad I was fully unconscious that night.

"So," I say, breaking the slightly awkward silence that has ensued between us. That's one thing that pains me about all this. The old Jack and I would always sit in a companionable silence, an unspoken understanding passing between us. Now, sometimes it's awkward, as if we both want to say something but can't pluck up the courage to do it. "What do you think the Guardians are like?"

Jack shrugs. "I don't know. I mean, do you have to die and be like reincarnated or was that just a me thing?"

"So you're saying that maybe they're not like you. They might have been just created and not had past lives or anything?" My heart drops. That hadn't occurred to me. I push the thought away consciously but it just comes back to haunt me more. What if Jack can't get his memories back?

"Perhaps. It's just a thought." Jack says dismissively, a smile lingering on the edges of his mouth as he turns to look down again.

I return my gaze to the ground and the semi-impenetrable darkness laid out beneath us; ground that has transitioned to ocean whilst we've been flying. Many people would say that I'm frightened of heights. In my opinion, I have a fear of falling. So when I'm in a situation where I can't fall I'm not scared at all. Like now—I trust that Jack would never let me go. But the moment I'm somewhere I can quite possibly fall I'm frozen with terror. I think it's the mere idea of being that out of control that freaks me out. Not being able to decide where you're going. Having your fate in someone else's hands. Or no one's at all.

I turn to the side and analyse Jack's face as he stares downward. The determined set of his jaw is just the same and his ridiculous messy hair is identical. I remember spending hours trying to make his hair lie flat by hitting him on the head as a kid, because it annoyed me so much that it wasn't neat. But eventually he would just laugh and start chasing me around the field or dare me to race him up the tree.

Jack turns to the side and sees me staring at him and smiles. I smile back.

Suddenly, a dark shadow slams into Jack, ripping our hands apart.

And I am out of control.

I am falling.

Down,

Down,

Down.

* * *

The wind rushes past me as I plummet. My vocal chords are frozen so I cannot scream, cannot do anything but watch as the ocean below gets closer and closer. There is nothing to grab onto, nothing to save me from the inevitable impact. It's this that gets me. The idea that it is so inevitable and unpreventable that it is impossible to save yourself.

"Jack!" I scream, regaining my voice. I mentally thank the fact that we were flying so high that it is going to take a long time for the quick descent.

"Jack! Jack, please!" I scream again. He's not coming. I am going to hit eventually.

"Jack, where are you?" I whisper. I figured that he'd always find a way back. Even through death he came back. _He came back_. I guess his return tickets have run out.

I stare at the ocean for one last moment, before I start to close my eyes. I don't want to see this. Just as I decide it will be my last look at the world, I see a shape rushing past me and suddenly I have stopped.

Jack stares at me, pure terror personified in his eyes. We are hovering in the air a few metres above the ocean. His arms are wrapped around me.

I stare back at him, tears still running down my cheeks. "Jack…" is all I manage to murmur before my throat constricts and the tears come more rapidly. Jack takes one look at me and pulls me into his chest and I bury my face in his shoulder.

"I'm sorry." he whispers again and again. My hands are shaking uncontrollably. Jack puts his hands on my back, one still clutching his staff. Eventually, my shocked sobs abate, and I pull away slightly to look Jack in the eye.

"Are you alright?" he asks, looking at me and narrowing his eyes.

"Fine. It's just…" I mutter

"You have a fear of falling. Being out of control." Jack finishes, raising an eyebrow, as if asking a question.

"Yes."

"I'm sorry."

"What happened?" I ask, uncomfortably aware of his arms wrapped around my waist and his hand pressing the staff into my back.

"There was this horse. Made of this weird black stuff. Like sand. It attacked me. And…" I analyse Jack's expression, including his narrowed eyes and mouth set in a line and I know that there is something he's not telling me.

"So I froze it and raced to get you." he finishes. "What do you think that thing was?" he asks, not so subtly changing the subject.

"Pitch…" I whisper. Jack watches me closely. "He's found us."

* * *

The rest of the trip passes rather uneventfully, and by uneventfully I mean no more attacks from creepy black sand horses and no more falling for five minutes.

Then, as we are travelling over ice and the air is getting noticeably colder, I notice a black shadow following us a far distance behind in the light sky. I point it out to Jack, and he speeds up. All this flying—especially for an extra person—is taking a toll of him, though he is trying hard not to show it.

I keep looking behind us at the shadow. "It's gaining on us." I update Jack.

"What's that?" says Jack suddenly, looking straight ahead. Perched on an icy cliff, there is what on first sight seems to be an immense castle, but what on closer inspection seems to be a workshop of some sort. Jack is now openly struggling, a red flush appearing in his pale cheeks.

The shadow is now so close that can make out its yellow eyes. It seems to be one of those horses that Jack was talking about.

We are headed right for the workshop, the planes of glass now blatantly obvious to me, reflecting the snow and ice around. The shadow is so close now I can hear its breath rasping.

"Hurry, Jack!" I yell. We are so close to the workshop now that I can see in through individual windows. Then we seem to pass a point where the shadow is halted by some invisible force but by that time it is too late to stop and we go crashing into a huge pane of glass.

Jack and I land on a wooden floor amid tables crowded with intricate toys and in a pile of shattered glass. I roll over onto my back and get an unpleasant jab from a sharp piece of glass. I hear Jack groan right beside me.

Then I look up and see a man with an immense white beard wearing red and what looks like an abominable snowman standing next to him. Then the man speaks in a think Russian accent:

"Who is this?"


	9. Chapter 8

**A/N: Hey guys! So thanks for all the feedback; I really appreciate it! Jack and Griffin are finally meeting the Guardians, but all may not go as expected! Happy reading!**

**Teresa xx**

* * *

"Uh…hi." I say, still lying down. I turn my head to look at Jack.

"Sorry about your window." I say, wincing at the glass crackling underneath my back. I sit up brushing the sprinkles of glass from my hair. I hear Jack moan from beside me, and look down. His staff is beside him among the shattered glass, and he has small cuts along his legs and face. But as my eyes travel up and down his body, I see that part of his sleeve is covered in blood, as well as his hand, and it is steadily dripping onto the floor.

He sits up with a struggle, cradling his bleeding hand against his chest and his face is paler than before if that's even possible. I can see immediately that the glass must have severed one of the main arteries in his wrist due to the amount of blood.

He collapses suddenly, and I catch him before he keels over into the pile of broken glass. His eyes are closed and he's completely unconscious. I give a desperate look to the man standing above us, and he says:

"Phil, take boy and put him in bed." says the man. The abominable snow man scoops up Jack in one arm. I stumble up off the ground and make to follow Jack, but the man with the beard steps swiftly in front of me, blocking my way towards Jack.

The man seeing my distressed face says kindly: "Phil take care of him. He will be alright." He closes the door after Phil the abominable snowman. "Now. You. Me . We talk."

"Ok…" I say skeptically.

"But first I am North. You are?" I am staring out of the window—or the lack of one—for around five seconds before I realise it was a question.

"Griffin Tarrow." I say absent-mindedly. "And… that was Jack Over—Frost." I add, catching myself as out of habit I say his old last name.

"Ok." North claps his hands and smiles. "First thing. Why did you fly through window?" He says, turning serious and knitting his eyebrows together.

"Something was chasing us." North raises an eyebrow. "A shadow horse made of…black sand. It was following us. Then it was halted by this invisible wall or something just outside here and we couldn't stop in time so we crashed into the window." And Jack almost had his hand cut off, I finished in my head.

"That would be the protection field that stopped it. And how were you flying?" he asks. I start to answer, but he interrupts me. "Jack Frost is not human."

"How do you know?" I say, looking at him, shivering slightly in the cold wind coming in through the immense window frame.

"I have a feeling. In my belly." Now it is my turn to raise an eyebrow. "Then if Jack Frost is not human, then what is he?"

"He's the winter spirit." I answer back.

"How does he know this?" asks North, tinkering with a small wooden toy on one of the tables.

"Because the Man in the Moon told him so." At this North, puts down the toy hurriedly and looks at me, stroking his beard thoughtfully.

"Man in Moon?" he repeats.

"Yes."

"Then come with me." And he turns and strides out of the workshop, me following in his wake.

* * *

We walk down a short corridor, panelled in wood, and then emerge into a huge space, which must be the heart of the workshop.

"Woah." I say, stopping short and staring. In the centre there is a huge void, with balconies of varying levels opening out onto to it, protected by intricate wooden railings. There are flying toys of different shapes and sizes, zooming around in a colourful array and by some miracle not crashing into each other. On the ground floor of the workshop, from which we are two floors up, there are the abominable snowmen, who seem to be working on hundreds of different types of toys, all in varying levels of completion.

In the centre of the void, which stretches up to a huge glass skylight, there is a metal globe, with little lights shining on the surface. Each continent is marked in some strange hard-to-read cursive writing.

North sees me looking and says:

"That is the globe. One light for every child who believes." He looks at me. "Impressive, yes?"

"Yeah." I mutter. I go to walk over to the balustrade to look down, but trip over something in the process. I hear the agitated ring of a bell and look down. What must be some sort of elf, slightly triangular in shape and topped with a small silver bell, is looking back at me, frowning.

"Sorry little guy." I say, absent-mindedly. I walk over to the balustrade and rest my elbows on it, and gaze down at the goings-on of the workshop. North comes to stand to next to me, placing his forearms on the wood, on which I can see the words "Naughty" and "Nice" tattooed.

"So Jack is your friend, yes?" He asks, looking at the globe.

"Yeah…" I mumble, twisting my fingers together.

"And he was made spirit by Man in Moon?"

"Pretty much." I reply shortly.

"And how you know him?"

"We were friends before… before he died." I stare at the globe so intensely that when I look away at the floor of the workshop I can still see the dots imprinted on my eyes.

"In his life before a spirit?" North asks.

"Yes. He only died a few days ago." I run my hand over my head and shove the wispy bits of hair behind one ear.

"So he hasn't got his memories?"

"No. Not at all."

"I am sorry. That must be hard. So he can't remember you?"

"No. He doesn't remember me." My voice breaks suddenly and I put one hand over my mouth as if to stifle the emotion. I stare at the globe until I have defeated the urge to cry. Then I remember.

"Actually, I was wondering if you could help—"

"With memories? Talk to Tooth—wait, you say that Jack died few days ago?" He asks suddenly.

"Yes. Why?"

"Man in Moon sometimes takes decades to make someone into spirit. Doing it so quickly must mean that something bad is rising." He looks at me, his round blue eyes underneath his very bushy white eyebrows full of concern.

"Well, yeah I thought you knew. One of Pitch's shadow horse things was following us." North goes pale and starts to stride away from me, hopping around a pair of elves holding a plate of Christmas cookies.

"Why did you not tell before?"

"I did!" I say indignantly, throwing my hands up in resignation. North ignores me. I walk over to where he is fiddling around with the fireplace.

"Time to summon other Guardians." He says without looking up. A button emerges out of the fireplace, and North jams his fist into it. From the globe, waves of colour similar to that of the Northern Lights rise up and with a flash have distributed themselves into the dawn sky.

Just as I move my head back down after staring open mouthed at the impromptu light display, Phil the abominable snowman reappears. North notices him too and says:

"Phil! How is he?" Phil says something unintelligible in abominable snowman language. Then they both look at me, as if expecting an answer.

"Sorry, I don't speak abominable snowman."

"Yeti. Phil is a Yeti." North corrects me. Phil looks outraged.

"Sorry, Phil." They are both still looking at me. "So…um, what did he say? Phil, that is." I say awkwardly.

"He says that Jack should be fine, but he needs rest. Oh and he says he wants to see you." My heart jumps at this last part.

"Ok…" I say slowly.

"Phil will take you." says North, staring at the Northern Lights above the Pole and probably wondering how quickly the other Guardians will get here. Phil beckons to me with one furry hand. I follow him, and he leads me through another corridor branching off from the main area of the workshop. We go up a few levels in some sort of enclosed moving bit of the floor, which fascinates me and scares me at the same time, because being pulled up several floors by only a bunch of cables doesn't seem all that safe to me. Phil mutters something that sounds like: "elevator" and I think that's what it's called. None of the buildings in Burgess are more than two stories tall, so we don't need one, even if by some stretch of the imagination we could build it.

We continue along another corridor which has a wall of glass at the very end, until we reach a door right next to the glass wall. Phil opens it slightly, and I thank him and he mutters something in reply and then I am opening the door into the room.

* * *

Jack is lying in a bed that faces the glass wall, which has an unimpeded view of the surrounding glaciers, cliffs and other snowy stuff. The door clicks shut with a soft noise behind me, and I walk over to Jack's bed. His eyes are closed and his breathing steady, heavy bandages wrapped around his right arm. The cuts on his face are still uncovered, and the red blood is a stark contrast to his pale skin. Phil must have had to rip his sleeve to get at the cut, and since the rest of his shirt and poncho are covered in blood they are hanging over a hook next to the door. Jack's chest is bare and I can see another long gash on the right. His ribs are painfully obviously. He always was slim—everyone in the town was due to lack of food in winter—but Jack especially, since he insisted on giving his sister most of his portion when she caught a fever in late autumn. Hunting isn't a very idle assignment either.

Aside from most of the minute details that I usually notice about Jack, the most blatant is the fact that he is completely unconscious. Very incapable of opening his eyes; let alone asking to see me. Frowning, I turn away from examining Jack, and walk over to try the door. I take a deep breath and turn the handle.

It's locked.

* * *

**So...what do you think? I'll update really soon... I'm almost on holidays so expect frequent updates over the next couple of weeks!**


	10. Chapter 9

**A/N: Hi everyone! Thanks so much for all the reviews; I really appreciate the feedback and some of them have made me think very hard about the plot so thanks! This is a longer chapter, but next chapter is going to be very tense (I think: it may be the chapter after that, I haven't decided)**

**Anyway, see ya!**

**Teresa xx**

* * *

I turn around, breathing heavily, my back against the unyielding wood. Perhaps it's just one of self-locking doors. But then why did Phil close it behind me? Maybe it's for safety. But they have a bloody protection force-field thing! Even as I am having conversation with myself in my head, the truth is inevitable. We are locked in. On purpose.

It's at that moment that I notice the second bed in the room, pushed up against the opposite wall. So whoever thought up this lock-up plan planned for a lengthy stay. I sigh and survey the room. There is a small door in the corner that seems to lead to a bathroom, and there is a small cupboard beside Jack's bed. Other than that, the room is practically bare. Through the huge glass panels I can see the Northern Lights spanning across the sky, which of course is still semi-dark, because it's the North Pole. I have a feeling that it's not going to get much lighter either, which is kind of annoying because the only light in the room is a small lamp perched on a tiny table next to my bed.

There is an uncomfortable looking chair beside Jack's bed, but I grab it anyway and start to go through the contents of the small cupboard beside Jack's. Most of it is other medical supplies and fresh bandages, along with a few bottles of some type of high-tech medicine that is virtually non-existent in our village, a needle and thread and a scalpel.

I straighten up and draw my chair closer to Jack's bed to examine his arm. After locking us in a room, I am slightly skeptical about Phil's medical skills. The blood is already seeping through the heavy bandages on his arm.

I whistle through my teeth, and slowly begin to unwrap the bandages. As I get closer to the cut, the bandages become harder to peel off, and the blood thicker.

I keep my eyes on Jack's face, really hoping that he won't wake up. I reached the last layer of the bandages and pull it carefully off.

Blood is all over Jack's arm, discolouring his pale skin and making his arm slick with the red liquid. The cut is long and deep, and wide open. I know immediately that it is going to need stitches. Still supporting Jack's arm with one hand, I dig out the needle and thread.

Jack's blood is beginning to drip down my hand, and somehow I manage to thread to needle.

"Oh God, Jack, I really hope you don't wake up during this." I whisper, knotting the end of the thread. I use a towel to wipe his arm clean of blood, before I begin the first stitch on his wrist.

I look up at Jack to check that he's still unconscious. His eyelids are completely shut. I look back down and complete another stitch. Jack's eyelids flutter. I complete a third stitch. His eyes open wide and the startling blue makes me jump, ripping the last stitch out. Jack gasps in pain.

"Sorry." I say.

"What the hell are you doing?" he says, through gritted teeth.

"It's too deep. It needs stitches." I say.

"Ok." Jack stares determinedly at the ceiling as I start to do the next stitch. I hear his sharp intake of breath, but stop myself from looking up and with a shaking hand complete the stitches along the length of the cut.

I dig around in the cupboard and find a fresh bandage. I look up at Jack, who is still staring at the ceiling, biting his lip. I bandage his arm quickly and tightly, and then set it down at his side.

"Keep it still." I tell him. He nods, and then winces slightly. I grab a few more bandages from the cupboard and move my chair around the other side of the bed to examine the gash on his chest.

"Are you alright?" he asks as I bend down to place the excess bandages on the floor. I straighten up hurriedly and look at him.

"I'm fine. It's you I'm more worried about. You took the full force of the impact." I say.

"Yeah and I was the one who flew us into the window in the first place." He says, half-smiling at me. I bend over the cut, impatiently flicking my plait out of the way.

"It's not very deep." I remark, but as I lean over further I can see sparkles of glass inside the cut.

"Damn it." I breathe, getting up and retrieving a pair of tweezers from the cupboard. I sit back down and look over at Jack.

"You're real lucky they have better medical supplies here than they do back home, or else I would be digging these out with a twig." I say, placing my right hand on Jack's chest to steady it. I feel his rapid intake of breath, and I wonder whether it's because of the pain or the fact I just placed _my_ hand on _his_ bare chest.

"This is going to hurt." I warn him. I start to remove the bits of glass from the surface of the cut, placing the red-stained pieces onto a piece of paper I put on the bed before. After a few minutes, most of the glass from the surface is gone, but I can see a few shards deeper in. I look up at Jack and see that he is biting his lip so hard that he's drawn blood, and a few tears are trickling slowly down his face.

I take a deep breath, and push the tweezers further into the cut, and Jack lets out a small cry of pain. I gently remove the glass, which is a piece about half as long as my thumb.

"That's it." I say, wrapping up the glass in the paper and throwing it into a bin by the door. The cut is bleeding more heavily now, and I place a small piece of gauze over it.

"I'm going to have to bandage it, Jack." I say grimly. He nods, wiping away his tears impatiently with his good hand. I grab one of the bandages off the floor, and Jack pushes himself up into a sitting position with one hand. I proceed to wrap the bandage around his chest, passing the roll from one hand to the other, trying to ignore to fact that my hand keeps brushing accidentally against his back.

I secure the bandage and Jack slumps back onto the bed, staring dejectedly at the ceiling.

"They've locked us in." I say, staring out the window.

"What?"

"Yeah, I know. And North's summoned the other Guardians because I told him about Pitch."

"Who's North?"

"The one that look like St Nicholas." Jack nods, and we sit in silence for a while.

"What the hell is that?" I sit up straight and stare out of the window. Shining brightly against the dark sky are these threads of gold, expanding out in all directions, and leading to a small island of swirling golden threads. In the very middle of the floating island, a small golden man sits.

Jack pushes himself up and stares as well, and we watch as the golden island floats out of sight, undoubtedly to the other side of the workshop to meet North. Just as the golden light has faded out and been replaced by dark blue, another peculiar sight greets us.

Flying along so fast their wings are virtually invisible, come a group of what look like multi-coloured birds. As they draw closer I see that in the group is actually one larger bird, whose body is covered in a dazzling array of brightly coloured feather, surrounded by miniature versions. They fly past, in the same direction as the golden man did.

"What on earth?" I whisper.

"They must be the other Guardians." Jack replies.

"But if the other Guardians are here then surely we—" I'm interrupted by a loud knock at the door. I don't get why they bother to knock when it's locked, so I yell out:

"Come in! Oh wait, you can't because _someone_ locked us in." Jack smiles and rolls his eyes. I hear a key turn in the door, then Phil the Yeti sticks his head in. He is carrying a bundle of clothes, which he sets just inside the door, then looks up at us and leaves.

I walk over to the bundle of clothes, pick them up and carry them back over to the bed and put them down. A note flutters out. I grab and scan it quickly. Jack looks at me with eyebrows raised.

"It's from North. He apologises for locking us in a room, doesn't say why though, tells us that these clothes are for us because ours were ruined flying through a window and that the other Guardians arrived and he wants to see us as soon as we have changed."

"That was nice of him." says Jack, smirking at me.

"Still haven't forgiven him for locking us in." I mutter, setting the note down on the bedside table and turning to the clothes. I toss Jack the white shirt and brown cloak and vest that are obviously meant for him and practically identical to his old clothes.

I take the remainder of the pile and retreat to the bathroom, closing the door behind me. I hastily wash Jack's blood off my hands and forearms, then survey the clothes. There is a long sleeve green dress, a pair of black woollen leggings, and a black cape identical to Jack's. I change quickly, folding my old clothes and tucking them under one arm. My braid is coming out so I let my hair down, planning to re-plait eventually. I open the door and place my pile of clothes on my bed, my hair falling forward and creating a curtain between me and the rest of the room.

When I straighten up and turn around I find Jack staring at me, opened mouth.

"What?" I ask. Jack blinks hurriedly and closes his mouth.

"Nothing." he says, blushing and turning away towards the door. "Let's go."

"How's your arm?" I ask.

"Better." I raise an eyebrow. "Spirits heal a lot quicker than humans."

"Right…" I say, walking over to the door and pulling the handle. It is unlocked and the door swings inward. Phil the Yeti is standing outside, leaning against the wall. When he sees us, he jumps and starts to walk down the corridor, us following in his wake.

As we walk to start to redo my plait, staring straight ahead at Phil's back. Suddenly, I feel Jack's hand on mine. I whip around, one hand still up at my hair. He looks at me intensely, eyes roving over my face, before saying in a whisper:

"Leave your hair out." Then he turns and looks straight ahead again, and—it may just be the light—but his face seems to be a bit red. The shock of his words have made me drop one of the strands of the braid, so I shake it out and tell myself that I did it because it was too much effort to braid my thick hair, _not_ because Jack just completely implied that it looked nicer out.

Phil takes us back down in the elevator again and it's Jack's turn to look astonished at the method of getting between floors, given he was unconscious for the last trip. He leads us back to what must be the main gathering place in the workshop, where I first saw the globe with all the lights. A long wooden table has been dragged into the middle of the room and there are little elves wandering around everywhere, pointy heads ringing merrily.

"Watch the elves." I whisper to Jack. He smiles at me, then down at his feet. At that moment North notices us and springs up from the table—almost crushing one of the elves under boot—and pulls both of us into a bone-crushing hug. After he eventually lets us go and after we've spent five seconds catching our breath I say:

"North. I just have one quick question: Why the hell did you lock us in a room when Jack had a cut that was so deep it needed ten stitches?" I cross my arms over my chest defensively.

"Here we go again." Jack mutters.

"Ah." says North, smiling. "You see; I wasn't if I could trust you. You know, you just fly through window and tell me that Pitch is rising and so on… it was just a precaution." He grins widely, and sweeps his arm towards the table: "Take a seat".

"That's one thing to tell the village." I mutter as I sit down beside Jack. "St. Nick has serious trust issues."

North sits back down at the head of the table, and I survey the group at the table. On North's right is a kangaroo—no wait, a bunny that just happens to be about six feet tall, who is glaring at Jack, who is glaring right back; and next to the bunny, is the bird who we saw flying through the night earlier—her wings up close are even more dazzling and her face is young and kind. On North's left, there is the small golden man, who appears to be sleeping, hovering half-in and half-out of his seat.

"So. Time for introductions. This is Bunny," says North, gesturing to the bunny-who-resembles-a-kangaroo who continues giving Jack the death stare. "Tooth," North indicates the bird-like woman across from me, who smiles and waves merrily at me. "And Sandy." The man continues sleeping. "Sandy!" North says again, tapping his shoulder. "Wake up!" Sandy falls back into his seat, blinks sleepily then surveys the table.

North gives me a look.

"Ah…I'm Griffin Tarrow." I turn to Jack, who is still having the staring competition with Bunny. "And that's Jack Frost." I say, nudging Jack in the shoulder. He blinks and Bunny gives him a look that says plainly: "I won." Tooth is busy chattering away to her miniature fairy counterparts, reciting names of far-fetched places and countries. Sandy is signing things above his head in golden sand; North is talking to an elf about cookies. Jack is busy freezing the table. I sigh.

This is going to be one interesting meeting.


	11. Chapter 10

**A/N: Hey everyone! Thanks for all the feedback and the reviews! I'll try to reply to all reviews, so if you have an account I'll PM you and if it's a guest review I'll put the reply at the bottom of the following chapter! Sound good?**

**Enjoy and have a nice weekend!**

**Teresa xx**

* * *

"So." booms North. Everyone at the table stops talking—or signing in Sandy's case. "I have summoned you here because of these two." He gestures toward Jack and I. "They saw Pitch."

There is collective gasp from the rest of table, and Sandy has a question mark above his head. "Um…yeah. we were flying here and there was one of these horses, made of what I think was black sand and it was chasing us…" I look back at North, who nods.

"Pitch is back." He says.

"But he hasn't been back since the Dark Ages." says Tooth, looking worried.

"Exactly." says Bunny, in a thick Australian accent that makes me want to start laughing. I mean, he looks like a kangaroo, has an Australian accent and is the Easter Bunny. Wow. "So he may be weaker."

"Or stronger." says North. "Fear has not gone away since the Dark Ages. It's merely lurked in the shadows."

"Have any of the lights gone out?" asks Tooth, looking over Sandy's head at the globe.

"No." North shakes his head. "They're all still there."

"But you would think that if he planned to rise again that would be the first thing he would target." says Bunny. I can see Jack smirking at Bunny out of the corner of my eye. Bunny gives him a withering look. The table lapses into a thoughtful silence.

"Oh and I meant to ask: what the hell is he doing here?" says Bunny, gesturing to Jack.

"Bunny!" scolds Tooth.

"Jack is the winter spirit." says North calmly.

"Exactly, so I can freezing off your—" starts Jack angrily, pointing his staff at Bunny.

"Jack." I warn, knocking his staff down with one hand. Tooth and I exchange a look. Our arguments are interrupted by a loud ringing sound. Everyone looks at Sandy, who is holding one of the elves by their head and shaking it so the bell rings. Once he has got our attention, he drops the elf, who stumbles away looking very disgruntled. He signs above his head very quickly: I catch an arrow towards Jack and I, a crescent moon, and quite a few question marks. I feel like having a question mark above my head at the moment too.

North is nodding and translates for the rest of us.

"Sandy asks whether Man in Moon has anything to do with this." He pauses then looks at us. "The thing is: Jack died only few days ago. Normally it takes Man in Moon years to make someone spirit. But it was almost instantaneous for Jack."

Jack looks at me puzzled. I shrug as if to say: "I had to tell him."

"What's that mean then?" asks Tooth.

"That he's going to be a real pain in the—"

"Bunny!" says North, raising a bushy eyebrow. He turns back to Tooth. "That Man in Moon thinks something bad is going to happen."

There is an ominous silence at the table. Which is broken when Bunny starts laughing.

"Just because Man in the Moon made this little Jackass here—" he splutters.

"Hey!" says Jack indignantly.

"—Doesn't mean that something _bad_ is going to happen. Well, apart from the fact he was created in the first place—"

"That's quite enough, Bunny." Surprisingly, Bunny closes his mouth. Then, Bunny starts to point to Jack and shake his head. I turn to him.

"You did not just freeze the Easter Bunny's mouth shut!"

"I can neither confirm nor deny that." Jack smirks.

"Oh, for God's sake." I mutter, rolling my eyes.

"Jack, unfreeze Bunny." demands North. Jack continues smirking arrogantly. "Now." Jack reluctantly flicks his staff and Bunny coughs.

"Back to what we were talking about." says North.

"What is she doing here?" says Tooth, looking quizzically at me.

"Is it really necessary to question the motives for everyone being at this table?" I say exasperatedly.

"Yes." says Bunny. North gives him a look.

"No, no, I just meant…well you're human and you can see all of us." says Tooth, looking around the table for support. "It's rare that a human ever comes to the North Pole, let alone attends a meeting of the Guardians."

I feel my face heat up as I stutter: "I'm a friend of Jack's…from before, when he was human." Tooth nods sympathetically. There is another awkward silence at the table, only broken by the sounds of the elves' bells ringing as they totter around with plates of mince tarts and yet more Christmas cookies. Then North claps his hands making all of us jump.

"Ok. Jack. You and me need to talk. Everyone else; you go to your usual rooms at the Pole. We talk later ." We all stand up from the table and Jack follows North down the corridor to a different room than the one we landed in; probably because the window has to be fixed. Bunny casts an annoyed look at Jack's retreating back before tapping his foot against the ground and disappearing down a rabbit hole. Sandy takes off down the corridor, hovering above the ground sleeping, and banging into the walls every couple of metres, which wakes him up.

That just leaves me and Tooth. She smiles at me and I say hesitantly: "Um… Tooth, would you mind if I talk to you? It's about memories." She gives me and knowing look.

"Jack's memories?"

I go red. "Yeah."

"You're wondering if there's any way to get them back." This girl is a mind-reader.

"Yeah, basically. I mean, some of them are coming back already—like I didn't have to tell him my name; he remembered it. And he knew where his house was and that I had a fear of falling… but sometimes it's like he's completely distant and…" My throat constricts and I look at the globe. Tooth flies over and puts a hand on my shoulder. Tooth flies over and puts a hand on my shoulder.

"There is a way to get them back." Tooth says slowly.

"Seriously? How?" I say, my excitement rising.

"Through the teeth we collect from a child. They hold the most precious memories of childhood." She smiles at me.

"So… Jack could get his memories back?" I run my fingers through my long hair, trying to comprehend that what I've been hoping and hoping was true is actually reality.

"Yes." Tooth replies. But when she looks at me, she still looks sad. "But just remember that many spirits don't want their memories back. It's easier just to move on."

"But sometimes what is easiest isn't exactly right. Most of the time actually."

"Trust me, Griffin. I know from personal experience." And she flies off down the corridor, the same way that Sandy went, albeit a bit more gracefully.

I turn and look over the railing at the yetis, who are still working and the elves who are pretending to be working. Then I hear a floorboard creak and whip around. Jack is standing there, just watching me.

"How long have you been standing there?" I ask suspiciously.

"Long enough." Oh no.

"Did you—"

"Yes, Griffin, I heard almost everything." Jack looks at me, and I can see the hurt in his eyes. "I've told you I don't know if I want my memories back. As Tooth said it's too painful. That's a decision that I need to make—"

"It's a decision that _you_ make and that affects all the people who love you." I say, staring at him. He sighs and runs a hand through his hair, making it stick up even more.

"Griffin, I'm really sorry but I don't see why you can't just let go." He looks at me, the same expression in his blue eyes as there used to be in his brown ones.

"I can't let you go!" I scream. "Okay? It's impossible."

"Nothing is impossible!" Jack yells back.

"Yeah? Well how about letting go of the only person who ever understood you? The only person who had been there for you when your father died and your mother packed it in and ran off with a handsome trader?" I scream at him.

"I don't remember—"

"That was you Jack!" I shout, tears streaming down my face and my hair going everywhere. "So if you think it's too painful to remember; then try forgetting." I stalk past him, shoving him out of the way with my shoulder. I break into a run when I reach the corridor, unable to control my sobs; leaving Jack confused and desolate behind me.

* * *

There's a small clock hanging on the wall of the small room: it reads about six o'clock. I fall straight into bed with all my clothes on, only bothering to take off my boots and turn to face the wall.

I hear Jack come in about half an hour after me, closing the door gently behind him and going straight over to my bed. I close my eyes and pretend to be asleep.

"Griffin." says Jack. I don't answer. "Griffin." he repeats, grabbing my shoulder. I remain completely still, focusing on my breathing. "I know you're awake." He sighs. "I'm sorry." He stays next to me for a few more minutes, hopeful of a reply, before releasing his grip on my shoulder, and going to bed.

It must be about ten or so when I wake again. At first I pause, staring up at the ceiling wondering what woke me. Then I hear it again: a low pitched moan. I sit up straight and look over at Jack. He is tossing and turning, one of his long arms flung out to the side.

"No." he whispers. "No, no, no." I pull the covers off my bed and swing my legs over the side, all the while watching Jack.

"Get away from her." he says, louder this time. I get up and walk over to the side of his bed. "NO!" he yells, his faced contorted with anguish. "ALISON!" he screams. My heart lurches as I recognise the name. He's remembering his sister in dreams.

"Don't you dare touch her, Pitch!" He says again. This is not a dream then. It is a fully fledged nightmare. "No, not, please—" he mutters. He is thrashing around in panic and I'm afraid that he's going to rip the stitches in his arm or do something worse.

"GRIFFIN!" he screams again. I stagger backwards, staring at him. Then I overcome my brief moment of panic, and rush forward saying "Wake up, Jack. Please wake up." His screams leave the other side of the conversation to my imagination.

"Don't touch her!" he says again. A pause as the other voice speaks inside his head. "Why?" he repeats mockingly. "Because I love her." he says in barely more than whisper.

Then his eyes fly wide open and he sits up, breathing heavily. Then it's as if its' all too much. He pulls his knees up to his chest and buries his head in his arms. His shoulders are shaking and before I know what I'm doing I've climbed up onto the bed next to him and wrapped my arms around him and he's leant his head against my shoulder and is sobbing silently.

"It was Pitch wasn't it?" I whisper. He nods and cries harder.

"I saw them." He says. "The first time I ever saw them…but I knew who they were." I nod and hold him tighter, resting my head on his and staring out of the window. Once I think I see a shadow of the deepest black streak through the night sky, but I can't be sure. We sit like that for ages, until Jack's breathing has return to a normal pace. Neither of us says a word about the last thing he whispered: he probably doesn't know he said it out aloud and I'm not going to breach the subject.

At last Jack takes a shuddering breath and says: "Pitch was there and he had…he had my mother and my sister. And you." He looks at me then away again. "He was torturing them. And I had to stand by and watch…and he told me it was only a matter of time before he got to them for real."

"Got to them for real…" I whisper to myself. I remember the black flying past our windows. And I finally connect the dots.

"Pitch." I say, sitting up straight. I jump off Jack's bed and pull on my boots quickly, then rush to the door. "Stay here." Jack looks at me, confused, but I turn and open the door.

Pitch Black is at the North Pole.

* * *

**Expect the next chapter soon!**


	12. Chapter 11

**A/N: Hello!**

**Well, here is the next chapter! Have fun reading!**

**Teresa xx**

* * *

I fly down the corridor, hastily pulling my hair into a ponytail to keep it out of my eyes. My adrenaline is stilling running high by the time I reach the elevator and I am force to wait as it moves all too slowly between floors. I take a shortcut and end up behind a pillar, looking out onto the place where we meet the Guardians before.

The Guardians all seem to be sitting at the table in the exact places are before. At first I am outraged that they were having a meeting without Jack and me, and then I see the spirals of black emanating from the corners of workshop. I watch, horrified as the black sand materialises into a tall man, whose face I cannot see.

Black horses are circling around the table where the Guardians are sitting. I want to cry out to warn them, but then I see that none of them are responding. Sandy, who is the only Guardian whose face I can see, seeming to be _sleeping, _but for Sandy that's not unusual. But Bunny's head is perfectly still, as if he is looking straight ahead. So is Tooth's; her wings folded neatly behind her. North has his hands on the table, and seems to be looking straight ahead as well.

I lean around the pillar little bit for a better look. It almost appears as though North's eyes are _closed,_ like Sandy's and his chest rises and falls steadily with his breathing. As I divert my focus from North, I see that the man in black has disappeared from my view.

"Boo." says a voice behind me. I jump and trip over something, sprawling forward on the floor. I turn around quickly and see the man leaning over me, a menacing grin on his face. And I know immediately who it is. Pitch Black. I scramble backwards and try to get away from him, but I hit Bunny's chair and Pitch grabs me with one hand, and hauls me roughly to my feet.

"You really didn't think that you could outrun fear, did you?" He snarls at me, and drags me to the space of floor between the table and the wooden railing. He dumps me between two of his shadow horses and sweeps onto the floor like it is a stage, and me his sole audience member.

"So what do you think?" he says, opening his arms and gesturing around the room.

"Of what?" I say, unimpressed.

"Of this!" He gestures to the Guardians.

"Well, personally I think they are pretty cool—though Bunny is rather argumentative; however I know you are prejudice against them so—"

"Not of them, you silly girl. Look closely." he says, rolls his black eyes.

"Well that's kind of hard when these bloody horses are—"

"They're asleep!" says Pitch exasperatedly. "And they will stay that way." He looks at me, narrowing his eyes and contributing along with his sharp chin and hooked nose to his overall appearance of a snake. "Forever."

"What?" I splutter, completely confused. Pitch rolls his eyes again and begins to pace up and down the wooden floor.

"Let me explain. You see, since the Dark Ages, I have been exile." He turns and looks at me. "Yes, just in exile. Because, silly girl, _fear _will always be here. _Fear _is not something the Guardians can ever destroy. So by creating them, the Man in the Moon only really kept me at bay." He starts pacing again, casually as if this was nothing more than a Sunday stroll. "When they defeated me, because children _believed _in them, I knew when I came back I would have to be stronger." He stops again, this time right in front of me.

"But you see: _I was already strong._ So what prevented me from victory?" He asks me, grabbing my chin in one grotesque finger and forcing me to look up into those pitiless voids of black.

"_Them."_ he says venomously, releasing me and pointing at the Guardians in their chairs. "So I knew I had to get rid of them." he continues nonchalantly. "Without them, no child would _believe_. No child would be able to control their _fear._"

He starts pacing again. "But how to do that? It's impossible to kill them… they _are_ immortal after all; however they don't necessarily have to be dead—merely not functioning. Would you agree?" He looks casually over at me. I scowl back. "So what to do? What. To. Do. Well the answer is simple." He laughs, sending unwanted chills down my spine. "Create a nightmare sand. An eternal nightmare sand. Force it on the Guardians." He turns and looks at me directly across the room, smiling proudly.

"And the Guardians are sleeping. Never to wake." He laughs louder this time. "Ever." He pauses. "There is a cure of course. Everything has a cure. But you'll never find it." His shadow horses shift next to me, closing in slightly. I glance around, then start to edge toward the corridor, but a horse cuts me off.

"Oh, you didn't really think I'd let you go." Pitch says without turning around. "Not after you've heard all that." He turns suddenly and strides towards me. "But how to finish it. Ah… the way it started. _Nightmares_."

Suddenly out of his palm he creates a shimmering mass of black glittering sand. I barely have time to comprehend his twisted and evil visage before I see the nightmare sand rushing at me and everything goes black.

* * *

I stand in a cavernous room; all surfaces are made of glittering marble. Pure black marble. A fire burns green in the centre of the room, in a huge pit. Suddenly, I become aware of another presence in the room. Make that another two.

I turn around and see nothing but blank stone. I whip around the other way, and see Pitch standing where I'd seen air a few seconds ago. And he isn't alone. Held by his cape, Jack is on his knees on the smooth floor.

I try to cry out, but my mouth is frozen. I try to move but it's as if an invisible wall has been erected in front of me and I can only stand and watch, drowning in my own agony. Suddenly another man appears, the back of his neck gripped by Pitch's sickly hand. A man with brown hair. And green eyes. Just like mine.

Pitch smiles nastily, then throws his hand back. My father goes flying backwards and hits the wall with a sickening thud. Pitch cackles. Then out of nowhere he produces a long knife from inside his cloak, and swings it wildly. It hits its target, sinking straight into Jack's stomach. Pitch pulls the knife out, slick with blood, and Jack collapses on the floor, curling into a ball, his arms wrapped around his stomach. His face is filled with agony.

My father is slumped at the base of the wall, seemingly peaceful with his head tilted to one side. Illusions of peace are shattered when I see the drops of blood trickling down his face. Meanwhile, Pitch has produced a stick from somewhere and dips it into the fire. It comes away flaming green. Jack is scrambling away from Pitch, blood soaking through his shirt, but Pitch is faster, slamming the stick down onto Jack's arm. Jack screams in agony, the hot fire scorching his pale and cold skin.

Memories catch at the edges of my brain, and I tug at them frantically. I have seen or heard this before. I tell myself. I _know _I have. I work through my thoughts methodically, trying to make sense of them. I have seen Pitch before. I've _meet_ Pitch. He said something…something about nightmares.

I follow my thoughts of Jack. The sight of his tear-streaked face triggers something in the back of mind. A memory of a nightmare and pain. Torture. Agony. Having to watch.

I am so close. So tantalizingly close. Then it clicks. This is a nightmare I tell myself. Just a nightmare. I feel something break. My vocal chords unfreeze and I can move my foot. I put my hand out flat against the wall of glass. Pitch is too busy moving over towards my father to notice what I am doing. I lift one finger of the glass, then place it back down again. A crack appears. I do it with another finger. Another crack appears. I try the other three fingers.

A spiders' web of cracks has appeared in the glass underneath my hand. I place my other hand against the glass. A web of cracks identical to that of the other hand appears instantaneously. I lean forward and gently place my forehand on the glass.

It shatters.

* * *

I open my eyes with a start. I see Pitch looking back at me; his expression turning from confused to angry to absolutely furious.

"How did you…? How did you break the…? No one can fight fear!" He splutters in disbelief. I give him the most patronizing smile I can.

"I can." My eyes flick up to the globe. Pitch follows my gaze in time to see Jack flying straight towards him.

"Oh. And he can too." I add. Jack lands square on Pitch's shoulders, staff in hand, determination on his face. Pitch waves his hands around wildly, trying to prise Jack off him, but Jack merely jumps off him and alights easily on the floor a few metres away.

A horse starts to advance towards him, but with a simple flick of his staff Jack freezes it in its tracks—literally—then leans nonchalantly on his staff and surveys Pitch with a casual air.

"So this is Pitch Black." he says.

"Don't you play indifferent to me." Pitch growls. His horses converge behind him. The shadows guarding me move over to join Pitch, leaving me standing on Jack's side of the room. I step forward until we're level.

"I have to say though. I did think you'd be taller." says Jack, smirking arrogantly. Pitch scowls. Then he raises his arms. The horses snort and paw the ground. Then they charge.

Jack's causal posture stiffens into an alert one, and we both back away. Jack is busy freezing horses left right and centre, with me taking refuge behind him. Desperate for something to do and since Jack seems to be overwhelmed; I cast around for some type of weapon.

I see one of North's swords sticking out of the pocket of his immense red coat hung over the back of chair. I dart over and tug it out. I turn and see a horse bearing down on me. I swing the sword randomly, praying that it might hit some part of its target. I close my eyes as I feel the sword impact something. I ease my eyes open, thinking I've probably embedded the sword in the table or something, and instead of a horse I'm confronted with a pile of black sand.

I smile in surprise and Jack grins at me quickly before turning back to the nine or so horses he seems to be fighting. Pitch is just standing across the other side of the room watching the fighting. I swing my sword again, hitting two horses at once. When I've reduced another four horses to sand, I dash over and help Jack; our backs pressed together, each fighting the horses on either side. Eventually, there is only one horse left standing; all others have been reduced to frozen streaks of black or piles of sand.

The remaining horse turns and gallops back to Pitch, its yellow eyes full of crazy anger and rage. Pitch strokes one bony hand along its head, then looks up at us.

"Oh Jack Frost. You may have won this battle, but you will never win the war." He laughs, the cruel sound echoing throughout the workshop.

Then he turns, and is swallowed by the shadows.

* * *

***cliffhanger!***

**HAHAHA!**


	13. Chapter 12

**HELLO! I'm back! Sorry for the REALLY long break, but I was on holidays and had no Internet so I could upload OR write! I hope this next chapter makes up fro the wait... Guest review replies are at the bottom of the chapter**

**Teresa xx**

**DISCLAIMER:** Rise of the Guardians belongs to DreamWorks.

* * *

I kneel on the floor, leaning on North's sword as I catch my breath. Jack is standing doubled over near where Pitch disappeared, clutching his staff and breathing hard.

"What the hell was he doing here?" Jack says, looking down at the ground.

"Long story." I reply, getting up and walking over to Jack, who has straightened up. He raises an eyebrow. Eventually I explain to him all that Pitch told me, including the nightmare.

"So basically we have to find the cure?" He asks.

"Yeah. That is going to be so easy." I say sarcastically, running a hand through my tangled hair. Jack surveys the damage around us, the streaks of frozen black sand and the Guardians sitting still and silent in their seats.

"We need to get out of here." Jack says, looking at the globe. Lights are already starting to go out.

"Agreed." I say, absent-mindedly.

"Flying is far too slow." says Jack. "And we're exposed."

"Hang on." I say, squinting at North, my mind racing. "North said something…" I walk over to him and after fishing around in his pockets from a few moments I find what I'm looking for. I hold it up to Jack.

"A snow globe." he says, "Amazing. But what we really need is like a portal or something."

"Jack, this is a magic portal." I really want to throw the snow globe just to prove my point, but it might help if we know where we're going first.

"Ok," says Jack, looking confused. "I'll take your word for it. So, genius, where are we going to go?"

I pause for a moment, looking at the sleeping faces of the Guardians. Jack answers his own question: "Let's go to one of the Guardian's homes. Pitch won't be expecting it. And they're better protected than anywhere else."

"Well maybe it's better to go where he's expecting us to go. You know, given if he thinks we'll be going somewhere then he knows we'll think that he knows where we are going so he knows we'll go somewhere different—" I say desperately, confusing even myself.

"Griffin," says Jack, not even fooled one bit. "Where do you want to go?"

"He knows that we'll want to go to Burgess." I whisper. "And I do. I want to say goodbye. Tell them where I'm going. Why I have to go."

Jack looks me in the eye, his icy eyes searching mine for I do not know what. "We should go to the Tooth Palace." he says, quietly. "But I guess we could stop over in Burgess."

"Thank you." I say, suddenly relieved. I allow myself one more moment of weakness, before taking a deep breath and getting another snow globe out of North's immense coat. When I turn around, I see Phil the Yeti staring at us.

"Hey Phil." I say, cheerily. He is looking dejectedly at the floor, which is covered in ice and black sand. "Sorry about that buddy." I add. "Look after them while we're gone alright?"

"See ya, big guy." says Jack. I throw the snow globe a few metres in front of us and it bursts in a swirling mess of colours. "Burgess." I say, then grab Jack's hand and pull him through the portal with me.

000

We land in a heap in the snow on the outskirts of the village. I disentangle myself from Jack and stand up, brushing the snow off my dress. I forgot I was wearing it. Probably not the most practical thing to be wearing to save the world from fear, but it looks good.

The village is a little distance away, the light from the fire flickering on the outskirt buildings. Jack and I start to head towards it. "Who've you got to talk to?" Jack whispers to me.

"My aunt." I say, quickly. I don't want to let Jack in on the second phase of my plan just yet. I lead the way between the houses I know so well, until we arrive on the porch of my aunt's house, the house I have basically grown up in.

I take a deep breath to steady myself and knock. It takes a few tense moments for her to answer the door, but eventually she does, the large and battered door swinging inwards, a yellow square of fire and lamp light falling on the wooden planks of the porch. Her face registers mine first with confusion and then with pure relief.

"Griffin!" she says, pulling me into a giant bear hug. "Where _have _you been?" she asks, trying to play the angry disapproving mother role, but failing because of her ear-to-ear grin. "Come inside." she says, flustered. She turns back inside and bustles down the corridor, narrowly avoiding tripping over one of her children who is busy flinging homemade darts at her younger brother.

I turn back to Jack, who was standing behind me for that entire exchange. His expression is one of shock and I know why. My aunt didn't notice him at all. "Coming?" I ask him. He shakes his head. "I might just stay outside. Walk around a bit. If that's okay with you." He looks worried, and his brow is furrowed in something more than concentration. I nod, then follow my aunt, down the corridor and into the kitchen.

Once she has hurried around getting me some of the stew she had cooked earlier and stopping her children from shooting each other, she sits down at the scrubbed wooden table and says:

"So. I want the entire story." In that moment I make a split-second decision. I can't tell my aunt the real story. Perhaps fragments, but nothing close to the truth. Telling her about the rising of fear would only increase her own fear and I can't do that to her. I just can't.

"Well," I say, my brain working overtime fabricating a plausible story in the space of a few moments. "I went riding after I came home, after the news about Jack…" I trail off, and my aunt puts her hand over mine. "And I rode further than I had in a while, and I… I met my mother on the road to Glebe."

"You met your mother?" says my aunt in disbelief.

"Yes. She and her husband—you know the trader she ran off with—were travelling to Albany in a wagon with their goods."

"Your mother…" my aunt mutters, still trying to comprehend that her sister-in-law has finally shown up for the first time in five years.

"That's not all." I say, this lie perhaps going to be the hardest to tell out of the many I've said over my lifetime. "She…she asked me to come with her. North. To Albany. And a few places after that. And come back here on their way back south." My aunt froze. Searching my face with her honest brown eyes.

"And what did you say?" she whispers.

"I said yes." My aunt opens her mouth to say something but I cut her off. "I need to get away from here. Everything—_everything_—here is choking me. Wherever I go. And after Jack…I just need some time away." My aunt's eyes are sad, but she nods and says:

"When do you go?"

"She wants to leave tonight." My aunt nods again.

"Alright. You'd better say goodbye to the children."

I sit at the kitchen table whilst she rounds up the four kids and explains to them where I'm going. The two youngest start crying, and I hug them all telling them I'll be back soon. When I reach the oldest child, Harriet, she sticks her chin out determinedly and says: "Goodbye Griffin."

I kneel down and put my arms around her. "Promise me you'll come back." she whispers in my ear, sounding scared. "I promise." I reply, my guilt weighing on me like a sack of grain. I straighten up and my aunt hugs me and tells me to be safe and all and I tell her to tell anyone who asks where I went to tell them the truth and then I'm out the door and standing in the cold snow, having just lied my entire life away.

I wander away from the house and around the outskirts of the village, not wanting to be spotted and have to explain myself again. I find Jack standing on the road that heads north, staring into the distance.

"You all right?" I ask, jerking him out of his daze.

"Yep." he says, still staring straight ahead.

"What happened?" I ask, not buying it.

"Someone just walked straight through me and I abruptly came to terms with the fact that no one except you and that old man—and he's half-crazy—actually know that I still exist." He says blandly.

"Come with me." I say, gently putting a hand on his arm and leading him off the road. Time to commence phase two. I weave through the sparse trees that surround the village until I reach a house that both Jack and I know well. I take him around to the front door, and we are on the porch when we hear voices. Or one voice rather.

I walk around the side of the house, and in the snow laying thick on the ground there sits a figure. She is rolling snow into giant balls and building a snowman. It takes me a moment to realise that there is no one else in the vicinity. She is talking to herself.

"See, Jack? I know how to build a snow man. You taught me. You collect all the snow and then you roll it and put a stick through the middle so that it doesn't fall over…" I suddenly recognise who the figure is. It is Alison. Alison, building a snowman and talking to her dead brother. The scene is so heart-wrenching that my eyes have filled with tears, which I blink away quickly before turning to Jack.

His expression is still blank, but he seems to be watching the scene with vague curiosity. He still hasn't realised who this is. I mumble to Jack: "Stay here." He nods and I walk over to Alison, who is sitting cross-legged in the snow.

"Hi Alison." I say, sitting down next to her and wincing at the coldness of the snow.

"Hello Griffin." she says without looking up. She doesn't even seem very surprised.

"Were you talking to Jack?" I ask her.

"Of course." she says, tucking her brown hair behind her ear and looking straight up at me. "Who else would I be talking to?"

"Alison, do you believe that Jack is dead?" I say quickly, fearing both answers.

"What do you think? Why would I be talking to someone who's _dead_?" she asks, shaking her head at me.

"Then where do you think he is?" I ask softly.

"Somewhere. Near here. I know he's here. That's why I talk to him." I smile at her.

"Well, what if I told you that he was here?" I say. I hesitate then plunge forward. "And what if I told you that he did die, but then he came back to life again? And that he's now the spirit of winter and is the reason that you have snow to build a snowman?" I regard Alison carefully.

"If you told me that, I would believe you." She says, turning back to her snowmen. "Though I would like some proof." She adds.

"Believe and you'll have proof." I whisper. There is the sound of shifting snow near the corpse of trees and Jack appears, tears streaming down his face. I think he's realised who I'm talking to. Alison hears him too and looks up.

She recognises Jack immediately, and springs up out of the snow, knocking over her snowman and yelling: "Jack!"

She runs to him and flings her arms around his waist. He looks surprised at first, and then kneels down and wraps his arms around Alison's slim shoulders. Alison is crying and so is Jack and I'm just sitting here awkwardly in the snow watching a beautiful family reunion.

When they finally break apart, Jack picks Alison up and she starts laughing and they both sit down in the snow next to me. Jack smiles at me and at Alison.

Jack tells her all about what happened since he died—skipping over a few parts, namely the nightmare and his injury—and I interrupt in every few sentences to add unimportant details. Alison listens wide-eyed and open mouthed and accepts all of it.

"Now Alison. You can't tell anyone about what we just told you, okay? It's our secret." I say earnestly. Alison nods. I stand up, knowing that we have stayed far too long in Burgess as it is. Jack takes my cue and whispers to Alison that it is time for him to go.

Alison just nods and gives him one last hug, before skipping up the stairs to the front porch and disappearing inside the house. Jack looks at me and we start to walk towards the northern road.

"Thanks." He says. I just smile and we walk in silence. We eventually reach the road, where no one ever ventures save for a few wagons or lone horsemen.

"Ready?" I ask Jack. He nods.

I throw the snow globe forward and say "Tooth Palace."

We step forward together and are sucked into the portal's whirling vastness.

* * *

**GUEST REVIEWS:**

**K: Thanks so much! I'm usually a lot quicker in between updates, but this was just one of those weeks! Thanks so much for the review I really appreciate the feedback SO much ! :-)**

**Thanks everyone for the reviews!**


	14. Chapter 13

**A/N: Hey everyone! I am very sorry for the long wait... I have just gone back to school and got an assignment on the first day, so I can't update as often as I would like. So. I feel I seriously haven't been updating regularly (let me revise that: I ****_haven't_**** been updating regularly) so to decrease my author's guilt and increase your satisfaction, I'm going to try updating every second Wednesday or Thursday. I hope that's okay! Enjoy!**

**Teresa xx**

* * *

We are spat out by the portal on a rocky ledge outside the entrance to what looks like a huge cave. All around us, clouds of mist hang, obscuring other peaks of rock and the grey sky above us adds to the effect of this being a great wasteland.

I turn back to the entrance of the cave. Inset in the rocky walls is a great purple circular door, with a golden frame and a large knob at centre. I cast a look at Jack and he gives me a bewildered look, then walks forward to try the door.

It swings easily open and I follow him through the entrance. We walk through a short corridor, consisting of rough-hewn rock walls and ceiling. This corridor then opens out onto yet another rocky ledge.

From the ledge I can see a whole lot of pillars that hang from a rocky ceiling high above us. Around each pillar are circular platforms at varying levels and in the below these platforms there are what appears to be rows and rows of storage, presumably for the teeth. Several huge holes in the rock walls and roof provide light.

I step forward and I can see all the way down to the bottom of the enormous room. There is a lot of greenery and vines hanging from the roof and snaking their way along the walls and floor. Clear blue water flows from several places and forms lots of rivulets and streams running through the greenery. Paths and bridge of stone form walkways and mist rises from the waterfalls.

There seem to be several bridges leading to a central point near the bottom of the palace, and Jack sees it and says:

"That might be where Tooth operates from." He grins and swoops off into the air towards the place.

"Hello?" I yell after him. "Not all of us can fly here." He stops mid-air and turns back to me.

"Sorry." he says, grabbing me by the waist and pulling me over the edge as he speeds down toward the bottom, weaving in and out of the pillars. He has his staff in one hand and grips me tightly in the other; my hair is whipping around my face and his cape is streaming out behind us and despite all that has happened, for some unfathomable reason I feel _happy_.

Jack whoops with joy as we fly low over a waterfall, and then finally come to a stop on a stone bridge facing another door. Jack's arm is still wrapped around my waist and we are both staring at this door, no doubt wondering what is behind it. He seems to notice that he is still holding tightly to me and lets go, blushing furiously.

I stride forward and grab the door and it swings slowly inwards. I beckon to Jack to follow and we gaze around the room. The floor is elaborately tiled in green, purple and gold, and the roof is lower and walls are rock. The most astonishing thing is that the entire right wall is almost completely non-existent; only a small frame of rock and then an unparalleled view across the palace, with the water mist from the waterfall pounding out of the rock below us rising to form a glaze across the entire image.

"What is this?" breathes Jack, looking around and poking things with his staff curiously, making them freeze that.

"Stop that." I say, pulling his staff away from a wooden table. I pause. "I think it's like a… living room?"

"Seems like it." Jack looks at the two doorways, coming off the room. "Right or left?"

"Right." I say. We walked into another huge room, this one lit solely by a huge hole in the ceiling, which has dramatically increased in height again. Vines hang all around the walls, like some giant tapestry and there is a huge four poster bed pushed against one wall.

"A…bedroom?" Jack asks in surprise.

"Tooth's got to sleep somewhere." I mutter in reply. Apart from the brightly coloured bed, the room is pretty much bare.

We move through the rest of the rooms; it seems to be the entire complex for the tooth palace. There is a replica of North's globe in one room that seems to be a library and a variety of other rooms that seem rather useless.

In the end we retreat back to the so-called living room. Jack crashes onto a couch and puts his feet up on a table; I curl up in a green armchair.

"What's next?" I ask, leaning my head back against the soft back and realising just how tired I am.

"We try to find a cure, I guess." Jack shrugs. "Might have something in that library."

"Maybe Tooth knows someone." I say vaguely. Jack laughs.

"Yeah and that's real helpful, given she's asleep."

"Perhaps she has some giant fairy contact list." I suggest.

"Or a portable address book." Jack fires back, smiling.

"I'm serious!" I say in indignation. "She's like four hundred years old… you can't remember the name and address of everyone you've ever met."

Jack shrugs. "I give up."

"So… we're camping here for a few days?" I change the subject, casting a look towards the bedroom.

"I guess so. Until we find something useful." Jack replies, staring out of the sort of window at the rivers below.

"Okay." I lean my head back against the chair again and wrap my arms around my knees. My eyelids become heavier and heavier until I surrender to the darkness.

A little while later, I am jerked back in consciousness. I wake up, with no idea what woke me. I find it rather useful being a light sleeper; however it's really unhelpful that I can never remember what woke me up. I'd be a horrible person to sleep next to during a fire.

I keep my eyes closed, savouring the silence, with the distant rumble of waterfalls from the base of the cavern and try to ignore the aching of my limbs. Fighting Pitch's horses with a long sword meant for a man twice your size really takes a toll on your physique.

I suddenly become aware of someone standing nearby me. I open my eyes just a crack, peeking out through my eyelashes. I can see Jack, leaning over me and looking concerned, before I shut my eyes again and pretend to be asleep. I am really not in the mood to talk right now. Jack must also assume I'm asleep, because moments later I feel his hand brush my hair away from my face, which is tangled from the ride through the portal and pretty much just downright disgusting. I resist the urge to open my eyes again, because I just want to go back to sleep, _not_ because I am secretly the savouring the feeling of his hand brushing gently against my cheek.

"Griffin?" he asks softly. I stay still and silent. Finally deciding definitively that I must be asleep, he slips an arm around my back and underneath my legs and lifts me up. My head rests against his chest and I can hear his heartbeat, steady, but slightly faster than normal. Still, it's good to know that spirits still have heartbeats. He carries me into what I presume to be Tooth's bedroom, though it's hard to know with my eyes closed. My suspicions are confirmed when I feel Jack put me down gently onto the four poster bed. I can see the brightness of the light streaming from the holes in the high ceiling overhead through my eyelids but it doesn't matter because the moment I feel the complete luxury of the bed beneath me—quite a change from stuffed straw mattresses—I am reminded of the fact that I haven't slept for what feels like an eternity, and darkness pulls me under once more.

When I wake, the ceiling above me is dark with the night apart from the silver sliver of the moon, streaming down into the room. I sit up, trying and failing to ignore my pounding headache. I look around the room for Jack instinctively, before I realise that he is asleep, curled up on the floor at the base of the bed, staff clutched in one hand. I get up and the coldness of the floor seeps through the soles of my feet—Jack must have taken off my boots—and walk over to him, and drop a blanket over his slim frame. I don't even know if he needs one—does the winter spirit get cold?—but it's the thought that counts.

I make my way through the labyrinth of passages, finally arriving in the library after accidently finding myself in a meeting room, a storage room and a pantry. The rough and cold stone floor is covered in dust; presumably the faeries can fly everywhere, so they need not disturb it.

I start browsing the shelves, at first just running my fingers along all the spines, marvelling at the sheer amount of books stacked vertically on the shelves, at the listing towers on side tables and the many open on the huge oak table in the centre. The only books I've ever read have been the ones that Emma owned, and Jack and I would read them to each other so much we knew whole chapters off by heart.

I finish inspecting the rows of books and walk over to the main table, my bare feet echoing in the huge space, with a magnificent green, purple and gold ceiling stretching over the tops of the wooden bookcases.

There are several books open on the table. Most seem to be catalogues of some sort, with names and numbers of absolutely no relevance to me whatsoever. What I really need is the name and address of a person who has some knowledge on the spirit world and just might be able to offer us a bit of information.

The lights on the globe at the centre of the room illuminate the books in a dim glow and I scour all the open books for any sign of anything, but there is nothing.

I hear a noise behind me and say: "Good morning, Jack. Or good evening."

I turn around and Jack smiles at me from the doorway and then walks over to the table, twiddling his staff between his fingers.

He stands beside me as I turn back towards the books and stretches his arms out across the length of the table, causing frost to emanate from his fingertips. He winces, one hand on the back of his neck.

"I never asked you to sleep on the floor, you know." I say without looking up.

"I consider it a very gentlemanly thing to do and you should be grateful." Jack says pulling a book towards him and rifling through the pages.

I snort with laughter. "Half the village could fit in that bed. I just consider it stupid."

"Whatever." says Jack. He puts his hands on his hips. "So what are we looking for?"

"Anything." I say dejectedly, staring around the library. This may take a very, very long time.

Time we don't have.

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**Mother Nature: Thank you so so so so much! Reviews like yours motivate me to write quicker, even when things get ridiculously hectic! I'm going to keep updating (see note at top) but it may not be as often as previously... anyway, thanks for the review I really appreciate it!**

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	15. Chapter 14

**A/N: Hi everyone! Surprise! I know I said that I would update every second Wednesday or Thursday except I was really excited about writing this chapter so that kinda went out the window!Thanks for all the reviews, favs and follows etc. and be ready for a lot more in store in the next few chapters!**

**Teresa xx**

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I am sitting on the floor on my stomach, flicking through a book with my chin propped up on my elbow. It is highly uncomfortable position, but it is the only thing that keeps me awake from the sheer boredom.

There is a stack five huge books high next to my head, and I'm about halfway through the book I'm reading. These books are old. And I mean _really old_. So old they don't have an index, which means I have to read through the _entire_ book to find one sentence of information.

At the moment I am in the middle of a passage about some old warlock who did something that was mentioned a few sentences ago that I can't quite remember and it is thoroughly boring. Let me give you a sample:

"Phoenix Tiernan discovered the properties of the phosphorus root in the northern European forests, which possesses unique qualities for immortal maladies. He is a practiced medicinal warlock, who has been curing and travelling the world of spirits since the Dark Ages."

And it goes on and on and on. I look up at Jack, who is lost in a book with his eyebrows furrowed together in mock concentration, balanced on top his staff. I focus my attention back on the page and forget the place I was up to, so I reread the paragraph again.

Something catches in my phrase when I see the words "medicinal" and "Dark Ages." It occurs to me that a medicinal warlock who was around the last time that Pitch rose from the shadows, might know a thing or two about the nightmare sand and how to cure it.

I jump up suddenly and upset the pile of books, and they hit the stone floor with a series of muffled thumps. Jack starts from the sound and topples off his staff and lands flat on his back on the floor, his book landing on his face. He pushes it off and looks up at me, annoyed.

"What was that for?"

"I found something!" I practically shout, waving the book above my head. Jack scrambles off the floor and joins me at the main table, where I point out the paragraph about the warlock.

"Phoenix Tiernan." he repeats. "Do you think he might be able to help us?"

"Probably. He has been around since the Dark Ages." I point out.

"Is there anything about where he is?" Jack asks.

"Yeah I think it was a few pages back." I reply, rifling through the chapter, until I find the page I'm looking for, and show Jack the paragraph. He scans it quickly looking, then looks back at me.

"So he lives somewhere in the forests of North Europe." He says. "Great. Real specific."

"It does say he lives somewhere in Finland."

"Slightly better." Jack amends, leaning his elbows on the table. "Well, keep looking. I'm going to take this" he holds up his half-finished book, "In the living room. Too warm for me in here."

"Okay." I reply, pulling myself up onto the table and crossing my legs and continue reading.

Eventually I have one more page to go, and have managed to find out that he lives somewhere in the south-east of Finland in the middle of a forest. I scramble off the desk to tell Jack what I've found and go out into the living room. No one is there. Jack's book is sitting untouched on the table.

Fear tightens instinctively in my chest. I walk out onto the bridge and head straight, my bare feet soaking in the warmth of the stone and slipping slightly from the condensed water vapour.

The bridge closes into a rocky passage, which I follow through a series of twist and turns until it eventually opens up again into a rocky room, which has an entire wall missing as it looks out over the rocky peaks of the mountains and the cloudy mist that obscures them. Jack is standing leaning against the edge of the right wall, looking right down to the ground far below, that is completely covered by cloud, so it's hard to know whether we're actually anchored to Earth at all or just floating with the clouds.

I walk over to him and he is so busy staring into the clouds that he doesn't notice me until I place a hand on his shoulder and he jumps.

"Hi." he says stepping around me and sitting down on the edge, dangling his long legs over the ledge and hitting the wall with his heels, sending showers of small stones into the abyss; creating miniature holes in the blanketing cloud. I sit down next to him

"Griffin." he says slowly. "I've been thinking." His voice is low and he is busy passing his staff nervously from hand to hand.

I spring up and walk a few paces away from him. "No…" I say softly, already knowing what he is about to say. "No…"

"Griffin, it's not what you think!" he says hurriedly, getting to his feet and facing me. "Just listen."

I look up at him and try my best to quell the tension rising in my chest, like a compressed spring.

"I've been thinking…about this entire memory thing. A lot. I mean, I haven't stopped thinking about it really but anyway." He says this very fast and very nervously, fidgeting with his staff the entire time. "You know, thinking about memories. What they _are._ And I thought, that maybe—just maybe—they're the most important thing we'll ever have. They're the ability to make mistakes and learn from them. To hate and forgive. To fall and get back up again."

He looks over my shoulder for moment, before directing his attention back to my face. "So when that gets taken away from you, it takes years to build that up again. And you'll never be the same. And I have years. I have all the time in the world. _Literally_." He looks me directly in the eye and for the first time it doesn't dredge up unwanted memories from when he was human. For some reason he looks just like, well, _Jack_. "But I don't want all that time. All I want is to be given enough time to grow up and to watch my sister grow up and have a family and be… be _normal._ And now I've had all that taken away from me. To be replaced with an immortality of frost, cold and indifference." He is silent for a moment and I say:

"But you still have a few of your memories."

"I do." Jack says absent-mindedly. "And I've started to wonder why. I don't think that it's usual for someone to remember something but not everything—the Man in the Moon wouldn't do something like that. It's all or nothing. You can't just leave traces, because then it's like you're stuck; between what you once had and what you have now. So then I thought, maybe it's because of the power of the memories." He pauses, then takes a noticeably shaky breath and continues. "Some memories that are too powerful to ever be destroyed by time or force or death." He stops again and I see that tears have begun trickling down his face. "And I think that's what the ones I remember are. My childhood home. Fragments of my family. You." His voice breaks and he stares at the floor before looking back up at me.

"I want to remember Griffin. I _need_ to remember all of it. I need to remember you." I realise that there are tears streaming down my own face and all of a sudden I've rushed forward and my arms are around Jack's neck and he is hugging me tightly back and we are both crying but laughing at the same time. I lean my head against his neck and for a moment we just stand like that.

Then the rock suddenly smoothens under my feet and I almost fall over, except Jack catches me and I realise that he's placed a thick layer of smooth ice across the entire floor of the immense room.

"Really?" I say.

"Yep." He lets go of me, glides gently over into the centre of the room, then turns back to face me and says:

"Come on! You know how to skate barefoot."

"And that ended so well, didn't it?" I yell back, my voice echoing in the high ceiling of the room. Regardless, I start to skate over to where he stands, then stop opposite him and place my hands on my hips.

"So what was the point of turning the floor of this room to ice?" I ask, skeptically.

"This." says Jack, then grabs my hands and spins me around the room, the rock walls flicking by so fast they are a blur and my feet somehow remaining underneath me. Jack spins me around in a flying pirouette and I laugh, my hair whirling around me. I'm not even worried about the fact that if Jack loses control we could go flying over the edge and make an even bigger hole in the cloud cover.

Spirals of silver frost emanate from Jack's feet and staff, and he grips me by the waist and spins me around in the air. We do one more circuit around the room at high speed, Jack letting go of my hand so that we are just skating side by side. I almost fall near the edge, and he grabs my hand and pulls me into the centre of the room and then somehow we end up standing on the freezing ice, with my arms wrapped around his neck and his hands resting on my waist.

We stare at each for what seems like ages, and my heart is beating hard and fast—because of the skating, of course. Then gradually, he leans his head down ever so slightly and slowly I bring my head up and he looks at me. And I suddenly realise that I don't resent those eyes anymore. I don't hate the fact that they used to be brown and soft but are now dark blue and icy. He's Jack. And he's _here._ Not some place where I can't reach. Not some place where all the other dead are. Just here.

A silent understanding seems to pass between us, and he leans down, closing the gap between us and kisses me.

And I think: _finally._

I don't react for the first few seconds because of the sheer shock. All these years and here he is, kissing me. He starts to draw away, perhaps thinking it was all a mistake, that he was wrong, before I wrap my arms tighter around his neck and kiss him fiercely back. His hands slide around to my back, pressing me closer to him and I wind my fingers into his hair.

I always expected—not that I ever expected or thought about this _at all_—that his lips would be cold, like the winter that is his being, but they're not and for some bizarre reason it takes me back to the pine trees in the forest back home.

Eventually we break apart and stare at each other for a few moments and then for some unknown reason I start laughing and Jack grins.

I am too busy staring at him and laughing to notice the spirals of black creeping across the icy floor.

"Looking for something?" comes a voice from behind us. Jack stops smiling and my laughter dies in my throat. We break apart and whip around. Pitch is standing there, leaning casually up against one of the walls.

In his fingers is a little golden tubular case, like the ones I've seen in the Tooth Palace. I gasp.

He has Jack's memories.

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	16. Chapter 15

**A/N: Hi guys! Long time no read! I'm really sorry about how long it has taken to update but I've been really busy with school and everything and its been absolutely pouring here which hasn't done anything to improve my motivation and I'm really sorry its been like FOREVER and I hope this next chapter makes up for the long wait! I didn't get much feedback or stuff on the last chapter so I'm hoping for a bit more on this one since it's like a major chapter in terms of importance so please please please reviews would be nice! Anyway, I know you don't want to be hearing every single one of my random thoughts, so here is the chapter and enjoy!**

**Happy reading!**

**Teresa xx**

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Black horses begin to materialise around us. Encircling us. Fingers of black start to stretch hungrily towards us and Jack edges closer to me, slipping his hand into mine, all the while staring defiantly at Pitch.

"How funny." he sneers. "You know—I never thought of this until now and I warrant you didn't either Frost—she could have killed you for all you know. See that's the thing. You don't know." Jack just continues staring at him.

"You don't know either." I point out. He grins menacingly back at me, then starts to parade back and forth between the horses flanking him, looking perfectly casual.

"Oh but I do. I can see your fears. _All_ of them." Pitch accentuates the word, turning his head to stare at us before turning around and striding down the length of the room. "And if you were any type of human being—which I am reluctant to say that you are—you would fear that this boy," he pokes a thumb at Jack, "would find out." He stops pacing.

"So, no Griffin. I do know that you didn't kill Jack Frost. But I also know that you are terrified that his immortality will be a barrier between you two. You know, a bit awkward him still being fifteen whilst you are getting older and older and older until you dissolve away with the wind. And then he is all that is left behind." Jack tenses next to me, and his grip on my hand tightens.

"But," Pitch announces, clapping his hands together and looking like a pleased teacher whose class has just grasped the concept of the alphabet. "we shall have plenty of time to discuss that when we are all cozied up happily in fear and darkness. What a lovely little party."

Jack's hand is shaking in mine, and I can feel the cold emanating off him, which a sign of his barely controlled anger.

"Well." says Pitch briskly. "We'd best be off."

Then the darkness closes in.

I come to leaning against Jack. His head is resting against the stone cold floor, and his staff is nowhere in sight. I try to roll over and become aware of two things. One, the fact that everything in my body feels like it's dying an extremely painful death. Two, is that my body probably feels like that because I am bound with shiny black ropes at the wrists and ankles. Great for circulation.

Jack opens his eyes blearily and realises the same things. I manage to push myself into a sitting position, ignoring the burning pain that the rope causes every single time it touches my exposed and raw skin. Jack sits next to me, and stares at the floor.

"I'm sorry." he finally says.

"For what?" I reply.

"For all of this. I dragged you into this and now I—literally—can't get you out of it. And knowing Pitch nothing good is going to happen to us and I can't die but you can and that is sort of a problem." He looks at me and his skin looks deathly pale in the low light.

"You didn't drag me into this. I chose this. All of it. And if something happens to me, then I asked for it." I say, then look away from Jack and try to survey the room in the limited light coming from an unseen source. We seem to be in some sort of antechamber, which we can see opens out into a bigger room. The room is made of uneven walls of rock that look like they form miniature houses of death in the rock every few feet up the walls, which slope away from the base of the wall, making the wall look like a steep route to infinity. Darkness envelopes the ceiling and most of the corners where the shadows lie, and there are black birdcages hanging from the ceiling high, high above.

All this makes me feel incredibly insignificant.

"Whatever you do," Jack says to me, turning his head from the enormity of the room. "do not tell him about the fact I remember some memories. Or about Phoenix Tiernan. Just don't say anything."

"I know." I say, shivering in the dark coldness. Jack looks at me concernedly.

"Are you cold?" he asks.

"I'm sitting next to Jack Frost in Pitch's lair." I say dryly. "What do you think?"

He continues staring at me, then edges closer to me so that our shoulders are pressed together and I lean my head against his shoulder.

"What is he going to do to us, Griffin?" he whispers. I can tell he's scared. Not for his life. But for mine. Love can be your greatest strength; but also your greatest weakness.

"I don't know." I whisper back. "I don't know."

Time passes slowly or quickly. I'm not sure which. We stay huddled together like that for that time. Until the shadows to resolve into the solid shape of Pitch standing in front of us.

"Well isn't this sweet?" he says. If there is one thing I've figured out about Pitch is that he loves rhetorical questions.

Jack and I sit in silence staring at Pitch, knowing that he will eventually tell us what he wants. We don't have to wait long.

"So. You're wondering why I brought you here."

"Just perhaps." I say. Pitch pointedly ignores me.

"Well, what with all the information you have about the Eternal Dream Sand, I couldn't really let you go so easily. Who knows what you could do to save them?" he pauses, then smirks at us. "Now, you can do nothing. But me? Well I have control over you. Complete. Utter. Control. And I have a feeling that you are hiding something from me. So really the question is: which one of you should I torture first?"

"Me." says Jack, hoarsely. I stare at him in horror and disbelief.

"You shouldn't take him. He can't die. So he wouldn't say anything because you can't hold that over him." I say quickly, averting my eyes from Jack's.

"But the threats I hold over him are not physical. No. His greatest weakness… is you." He pauses, considering and I interrupt.

"So, therefore it would be a better idea to take me. Torture both of us with the one."

"Good people are also so predictable." he frowns, looking like an annoyed child when their snowman falls over. "It gets quite boring after a while. Constantly sticking up for one another. Who would have thought that two people who argue over which one is tortured." He pauses again, looking thoughtful. "Well, I suppose it is a privilege, being tortured by me, but still…"

"The fact that you are overlooking," says Jack, carefully. "is that I can't die. Meaning that you don't have to be careful not to kill me. You can do whatever you like. No boundaries."

Pitch's eyes light up when he says this and I can tell I've lost this battle. "Good point. I never knew that you had a brain, Frost." Jack stares back.

"Well, I had better get started then." He looks far too pleased for this. The binds ensnaring Jack disappear and Pitch hauls him to his feet. Jack casts one more pained look over him shoulder at me, before Pitch drags him down a passage and into the darkness.

All that is left is the quiet cod darkness around me and the shadow of fear hanging over me.

I've been lying in the darkness, huddled up for about twenty minutes, when a noise wakes me out of my pained dozing. I sit up, grazing my wrists against the rough floor. The sound comes again. It is a suppressed groan of pain, coming from the passage where Pitch led Jack. The groan comes again, and I try not to let my mind run rampant as to what Pitch could be doing to him.

There is a brief period of silence, and I sigh in relief, as much as I know that it is not over. Just as my eyes have settled on the far corner of the room and I am ready to slump back to the floor and forget everything, the screaming begins. His scream is one of uncontaminated pain and anguish. I know that Pitch isn't just inflicting physical pain on him; only emotional pain could make a person scream like that.

I remember Alison's screams whilst she sat by the fire, weeping in her mother's arms. The screaming keeps going, and tears are streaming down my face. I focus on the corner farthest away from me, straining my eyes and start counting.

One. The screaming stops for a millisecond, then it starts again. Pain is never-ending. Two. Tears are streaming down my face more rapidly now. Three. Counting helps. It focuses my attention away from the screams of agony. Four. My hands are shaking in their binds and now sobs are accompanying the screams. Five. It's all I can do not to scream back, to tell him that everything will be alright. Six. It's becoming unbearable and I jam my hands into the ropes holding them and excruciating pain floods through me and the relief is bitter in my mouth. Seven. Muffled sobs are punctuating the screams now, and I'm biting my lips so hard as to draw blood, so my sobs do not join in a chorus with his. Eight. It stops.

The silence is deafening. My mind starts to run away from conclusions and I have to bring it back to the fact that Jack cannot die. It becomes my mantra in those few minutes. Jack cannot die. He cannot die.

Then Pitch reappears. And I know what is happening. The binds disappear from my limbs, leaving angry red marks behind.

"Time to see him. See him broken." Pitch smirks at me. And I follow him down the passage, a dead girl walking to the gallows. He leads me to a door, gives me a look, then leaves. I take a deep breath, wipe the remaining tears off my face and turn the handle.

The room beyond is dark, but it is not impenetrable darkness. Like the dark in the other room, it is lit marginally by some unknown and unseeable source.

But my eyes are not looking at the darkness. Or the light. They are only looking at Jack. Crumpled on the floor. Broken. I rush over to him and collapse on the floor beside him. His eyes are open, but staring blankly at the wall.

"Jack," I whisper. He moves and tries to face me at the sound of my voice, but he grimaces, and lies still. "What did he do to you?" I ask. But it is a futile question. I can see what Pitch has done. Jack's shirt is soaked through with blood, and it has pooled on the floor around him. His leg sticks out at an unnatural angle, and there are cuts on his faces. His expression tells me there was a whole new round of torture in his head.

My hands hover over him, unsure of what to do. He stares up at me, icy blue meeting worried green. I put a hand on his shoulder. He winces.

"What is it?" I ask, pulling my hand back. He frowns.

"Nothing… it's just—" he trails off. I place my hand on his upper arm this time. He winces again, and I hastily remove my hand again.

"Every time you touch me… it's like there is a million more wounds in my stomach." He grimaces again, but I look down to the blood on the floor. The pool seems to be…_receding_ somewhat. I place my hand on his shoulder again experimentally. The blood is disappearing and Jack's shirt is becoming less stained and soaked, and we are both staring in disbelief as the stab wound in his stomach heals before our eyes. Jack looks up as me.

"How did you do that?" he asks.

"I don't know." I say weakly, before placing my hand on his arm and after a few seconds his leg has realigned to its normal position.

"How…?" I say. Jack props himself up on one elbow gingerly and looks at me.

"Thank you." he says simply. His voice is hoarse from screaming. Something inside me breaks and I wrap my arms around him and we close our eyes for a moment. The immediate torture is over.

Jack pulls back and rests his forehead against mine. "I could hear you screaming the entire time." I manage to say. Jack just nods, and we are staring at each other. The pain from the sounds of his torture is still fresh in my mind. All I can hear is his breathing, harsh from the fresh pain. In that moment, I lurch forward and kiss him, and he wraps his arms around me and kisses me back slowly. So much is left unsaid. I tangle my fingers in his hair, and taste the salt of tears on our lips.

When we pull apart, we just sit there. Waiting for the return of the darkness.


End file.
